Universal wants to revive their classic monster properties. Their initial approach was to create big budget movies under the Dark Universe banner – problem was, they put so much money into The Mummy that even a $400 million global box office haul was disappointing to them. So they shifted gears and teamed up with Blumhouse Productions and writer/director Leigh Whannell for The Invisible Man, which was made on a budget of just $7 million, so its $143 million global haul was very satisfying. Now Blumhouse and Whannell are set to make a version of The Wolfman for Universal that has Ryan Gosling attached to star… but we haven’t heard anything about that project in over a year. Speaking with Collider, Blum provided an update:
“Wolfman, we are working on the script, got to get the script, right. Working on trying to get a script that (Ryan Gosling) feels good about and comfortable about and excited about.”
Gosling needs to be satisfied with the script because this take on The Wolfman is based on a pitch that he took to Universal himself. Variety said it’s
believed to be set in present times and in the vein of Jake Gyllenhaal’s thriller Nightcrawler with an obvious supernatural twist.
The Hollywood Reporter hears that
Gosling would play an anchorman who gets infected. The script has been described as having a vibe that evokes Network (1976) and Nightcrawler (2014).
Lauren Schuker Blum (who happens to be married to Jason Blum) and Rebecca Angelo, a writing duo that previously worked on Orange Is the New Black, were already working on the script when the project was announced.
In addition to the other projects covered in the Collider interview, including Happy Death Day 3 (Blum has a plan for this) and Bryan Fuller’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Christine (a “terrific” script was recently turned in), Blum revealed that The Wolfman isn’t the only Universal Monsters project Blumhouse has in the works:
We have two or three we’re developing. They’re not yet announced, so I can’t talk about them. But the status with Universal monsters is no different than it’s ever been. Universal is in charge of the Universal monsters. But we’ve come up with a few ideas that they’ve liked for a few of their other ones. And hopefully, we’ll turn those into movies.”
Blumhouse is working with director Karyn Kusama on a Dracula project, but it has never been said that Universal is involved with that. So we’ll have to wait and see whether Dracula is one of those “two or three” Blumhouse is working on.
Personally, I’m hoping Creature from the Black Lagoon is in the mix. The Gillman has been off the screen for way too long.
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