‘Dickinson’ Producer Wiip Preps Series Adaptation of ‘1984’ Stage Play

‘The Drifters’ Lands DistributionEXCLUSIVE: Starcross Entertainment’s latest feature The Drifters has been boarded for international sales by Media Luna and UK distribution by Central City Media. The film will have a virtual cinema release on April 3 and will be on demand from April 5.

During Color of Change’s Sundance panel “Looking Forward: The Future of Crime Television”, Terence Paul Winter, executive producer & writer of The Rookie; Sunil Nayar, former writer/showrunner of All Rise; and Melody Cooper, writer & story editor of Law & Order SVU unpacked a topic that is impacting storytelling on television more now than ever: the portrayal of policing and the criminal justice system in this country.

Amazon Studios has acquired the rights to Norwegian film Hope for series adaptation, with Nicole Kidman attached to star and be executive produced under her Blossom Films banner. Kidman most recently received rave reviews for her performance in the hit HBO limited series The Undoing.Per Saari is also exec producing.

EXCLUSIVE: Endeavor Content and Ink Factory are developing and co-producing a series adaptation of Yasmin Angoe’s anticipated debut novel Her Name Is Knight. The seven-figure deal was brokered by UTA in a competitive situation.

EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures Television has put in development Mother Daughter Widow Wife, a one-hour limited series  based on bestselling author Robin Wasserman’s novel of the same name, with Wasserman attached to pen the adaptation. Sharon Hall and her Mom de Guerre productions will executive produce. Sony Pictures TV is the studio.

The film adaptation of the best-selling novel Where the Crawdads Sing has added rising stars Harris Dickinson and Taylor John Smith to the cast.

EXCLUSIVE: Taylor John Smith and Harris Dickinson are set to join Daisy Edgar-Jones in 3000 Pictures and Hello Sunshine’s film adaptation of publishing phenomenon Where The Crawdads Sing, based on Delia Owens’ New York Times best-selling novel. Set up at Sony, the film is being directed by Olivia Newman from a screenplay written by Oscar-nominated scribe Lucy Alibar.

Joe Otterson TV ReporterApple is nearing an order for the limited series “In with the Devil,” with Taron Egerton and Paul Walter Hauser onboard to star, Variety has learned.The six-episode series would be based on the 2010 novel “In With The Devil: A Fallen Hero, A Serial Killer, and A Dangerous Bargain for Redemption” by James Keene and Hillel Levin.

Joe Otterson TV ReporterABC is developing a series adaptation of Elin Hilderbrand’s “Paradise” novel trilogy, with “Grey’s Anatomy” star Ellen Pompeo set to executive produce.The project is titled “Winter in Paradise,” named after the first book in the trilogy. The series focuses on Irene Steele, who shares her idyllic life in a beautiful Iowa City Victorian house with a husband who loves her to an extreme.

Joe Otterson TV ReporterStampede Ventures and wiip have partnered to adapt the first book in Gareth L. Powell’s epic sci-fi novel series “Embers of War” as a television show, Variety has learned exclusively.Gary Graham is attached to adapt the book for the screen, with Breck Eisner onboard to direct.

Warner Bros will be releasing Wonka on March 17, 2023, a prequel to Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory which focuses on the candy architect Willy Wonka’s younger days before having his confection empire.

Phil Spector, the eccentric and revolutionary music producer who transformed rock music with his “Wall of Sound” method and who later was convicted of murder, has died. He was 81.

Phil Spector was like “a bad marriage” in the wake of his death. The revolutionary music producer, who was serving a jail sentence for murdering actor Lana Clarkson, died on Saturday (16 January), aged 81.

Ronnie Spector has paid tribute to "brilliant producer" Phil Spector - but also remembered him as a "lousy husband". The Ronettes frontwoman has spoken out following the death of her former spouse on Saturday (16.

Several celebrities have taken to social media to comment on the death of Phil Spector after the disgraced music mogul died over the weekend, reportedly following complications from COVID-19.

Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorLegendary singer Ronnie Spector, who sang many of Phil Spector’s greatest productions as lead vocalist with the Ronettes and was married to him for six tumultuous years, posted about his death on Sunday, calling him a “brilliant producer but a lousy husband.”“It’s a sad day for music and a sad day for me,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “When I was working with Phil Spector, watching him create in the recording studio, I knew I was working with the very best.

R.I.P…

Phil Spector has died.

Phil Spector, the controversial music producer who was convicted of murder, died on Saturday, January 16. He was 81.

HBO has tapped Russian filmmaker Kantemir Balagov (Closeness, Beanpole) to direct the pilot episode of HBO’s upcoming drama series The Last of Us, the adaptation of the PlayStation video game, from Chernobyl creator Craig Mazin, game creator Neil Druckmann and Game of Thrones exec producer Carolyn Strauss.