EXCLUSIVE: Entertainment executive and producer Leigh Kittay has joined director, writer and producer Will Gluck’s production company, Olive Bridge Entertainment as their Head of Film.
13.10.2022 - 23:23 / deadline.com
EXCLUSIVE: One of Hollywood’s classic slapstick comedy franchises is looking to make its way back to the big screens as sources tell Deadline that Paramount Pictures is moving forward with a new Naked Gun reboot. Liam Neeson is in negotiations to star and Akiva Schaffer set to direct.
Dan Gregor and Doug Mand, who just worked with Schaffer on the Emmy-winning Chip n Dale: Rescue Rangers pic, also closed a deal to pen the script. Mark Hentemann & Alec Sulkin wrote the previous draft. Schaffer will also exec produce.
Seth MacFarlane and Erica Huggins are producing via their company Fuzzy Door. Plot details are being kept under wraps except that Neeson may be playing the son of officer Frank Derbin instead of stepping into the role made famous by Leslie Nielsen.
The original film starred the late Nielsen as Derbin, the detective with plenty of fight but plenty lacking in common sense. Over three films, Nielsen turned the lovable character into a hall-of-fame deadpan comic icon. The first film was based on the ABC series Police Squad, which had such bad ratings that it was canceled after six episodes only to be rebooted as a feature film in 1988.
That film became a huge hit and spawned two sequels and helped relaunch Nielsen’s career. When he died in 2010, talks began about rebooting the franchise. The right story remained elusive, though, but in recent months following the success of Top Gun: Maverick, another long-awaited relaunch from the ’80s, development began ramping up on a new Naked Gun.
Neeson may not seem like an obvious choice but has shown his comedic chops over the years especially in Macfarlane comedies. Macfarlane and Neeson still have strong ties and when the Ted director came to him with the idea, Neeson
EXCLUSIVE: Entertainment executive and producer Leigh Kittay has joined director, writer and producer Will Gluck’s production company, Olive Bridge Entertainment as their Head of Film.
Georgina Campbell had her big-screen breakout last month with Zach Cregger‘s twisty, face-melting horror debut “Barbarian.” So, what’s next for the actress? Deadline reports that Campbell joins Liam Neeson and Joe Keery in Studiocanal‘s upcoming sci-fi drama “Cold Storage.” READ MORE: ‘Barbarian’ Review: This Dark, Nasty Suburban Nightmare Will Nourish Horror Lovers The film follows a small group of people led by a bioterror expert in a race against time to destroy a dangerous micro-organism before it escapes a research facility.
EXCLUSIVE: Georgina Campbell (Barbarian) has signed on to star alongside Liam Neeson and Stranger Things‘ Joe Keery in the sci-fi actioner Cold Storage, based on the novel by David Koepp, which Jonny Campbell is directing for Studiocanal.
EXCLUSIVE: Physicist and author Alan Lightman has been pondering some major questions. For instance, “Where do we humans fit in the grand scheme of things? Are we just atoms and molecules, or something more? How does consciousness arise from the material neurons in our brains?”
A Glasgow street artist has lit up the city's streets with a hilarious mural of Liam Neeson paying ode to a man who is a staple of the Scottish airwaves.
EXCLUSIVE: Ron Perlman (Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio), Yolonda Ross (The Chi) and Daniel Diemer (The Midnight Club) will star opposite Liam Neeson in the mob thriller Thug, reteaming the Oscar nominee with Cold Pursuit director Hans Petter Moland.
Liam Neeson is in talks to star in an upcoming “The Naked Gun” reboot directed by Lonely Island musician, comedian and filmmaker Akiva Schaffer, according to Deadline. The original “Naked Gun” movie was released in 1988 starring the late comedian Leslie Nielsen as the clueless Detective Frank Drebin and went on to become a worldwide success spawning two more movies.
A new Naked Gun reboot is moving forward, with Liam Neeson in negotiations to star and Akiva Schaffer set to direct.
Naked Gun, according to reports.The actor, who has previously expressed an interest in a revival of the action-comedy film franchise, is said to be in talks with producer Seth MacFarlane (Family Guy) and The Lonely Island member Akiva Schaffer, who is set to direct the reboot.According to Deadline, Schaffer will direct and executive-produce the project from a script by writers Dan Gregor and Doug Mand, who he collaborated with on animated comedy Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers. The Disney+ film won an Emmy for Outstanding Television Movie earlier this year.While plot details are being kept under wraps, it’s claimed Neeson might be playing the son of detective Frank Drebin, instead of stepping into the role made famous by Leslie Nielsen.MacFarlane and Erica Huggins are said to be producing the reboot through their company, Fuzzy Door.In February this year, Neeson said he’d been approached by MacFarlane to lead a Naked Gun reboot, although the project wasn’t officially announced.Speaking on People (the TV Show!), Neeson said: “I’ve been approached by Seth MacFarlane and Paramount Studios to maybe resurrect the Naked Gun films.“It’ll either finish my career or bring it in another direction,” he joked.
Liam Neeson has demonstrated his particular set of skills in countless “Taken” movies, but he may soon be demonstrating his flair for comedy in a reboot of one of the biggest comedy film franchises of the late 1980s and early ’90s.
Are you missing Police Squad Sgt. Frank Drebin in your life? Of course, you are; you’re only human.
Liam Neeson for Paramount’s “Naked Gun” remake. Neeson is in talks to lead the film, Variety confirms. “Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers” director and Lonely Island member Akiva Schaffer will direct and executive produce the movie. Schaffer wrote the script with “Chip ‘n Dale” scribes Dan Gregor and Doug Mand. MacFarlane and Erica Huggins are producing via their company Fuzzy Door.Earlier this year, Neeson sparked chatter online after telling “People (The TV Show)” that McFarlane and Paramount had been pursuing him to resurrect the “Naked Gun” films. “It’ll either finish my career or bring it in another direction. I honestly don’t know,” Neeson told “People (The TV Show)”.
A federal judge temporarily blocked parts of New York state's new gun law in order to allow the Gun Owners of America to pursue a lawsuit challenging the legislation. Chief Judge Glenn Suddaby of Northern District of New York state in Syracuse ruled that the Gun Owners of America (GOA) have a legitimate case for lawsuit against the new state law complicating the process to obtain a gun license. The decision will not go into effect for three days to allow the New York government to appeal Suddaby's ruling to a higher court.
Manori Ravindran International Editor Richard Linklater’s action comedy “Hitman” has begun production in New Orleans for AGC Studios, with actors Austin Amelio, Retta and Molly Bernard joining the cast. “Hitman” stars Glen Powell and Adria Arjona, and was announced ahead of the Cannes Film Festival, where it was first introduced to buyers. Stuart Ford’s AGC Studios is co-financing the movie with leading indie financiers Shivani Rawat’s ShivHans Pictures and Monarch Media. Powell, who plays Hangman in Paramount’s “Top Gun: Maverick,” stars in the project as a Houston cop who’s been working undercover as the most in-demand hitman in Houston, until one day he breaks protocol in order to help a desperate woman (Arjona) trying to escape an abusive boyfriend. The project is based on a Texas Monthly article.
Richard Linklater’s latest film Hitman has started production in New Orleans and ShivHans Pictures and Monarch Media have boarded the project as co-financiers, AGC Studios announced today.
Dennis Harvey Film Critic Jalmari Helander hasn’t made a feature since 2014’s “Big Game,” then the most expensive Finnish film to date. It was an unabashed, bombastic, good-humored action crowd-pleaser that indeed pleased crowds — at festivals, while mysteriously failing to catch on with general audiences. Presumably his concept was just too “high” for mainstream viewers to swallow: Though they don’t have any problem with Gerard Butler or Will Smith doing similar honors, it seemed too much to accept a 13-year-old Finn boy singlehandedly rescuing the president of the United States from an obstacle course of assassination peril. That failure must have hurt; Helander has spent the interim on episodic work. His new “Sisu” is, in many ways, cut from the same cloth as “Big Game” as a splashy popcorn action piece unconcerned with credibility, pushing well-worn ideas to outlandish, and outrageously entertaining, ends. But the writer-director has hedged his bets by moving one key piece in the game to the opposite end of the board. This time, instead of a juvenile protagonist that made viewers wonder whether they were watching a movie for kids or for grown-ups (the answer “both” apparently confused them), we get a crusty coot quite spry enough to take on all foes. Which bad guys might pretty much be termed “the entire Third Reich.”