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Sony Pictures and producer Scott Rudin will turn the groundbreaking ’70s sitcom Good Times into a feature film. They’ve set a writer, Phil Johnston , whose most recent credits include Wreck-It Ralph and Cedar Rapids . Rudin will produce the family comedy with Eli Bush. While Rudin is selective about the remakes with which he becomes involved – Manchurian Candidate, Shaft and Sabrina – I think this has a lot of potential. The series, which aired on CBS from 1974-79, was one in a series of socially aware Norman Lear-generated sitcoms that pushed the envelope by mixing comedy with topicality and hot-button issues. Others included All In The Family (bigot patriarch), One Day At A Time (struggling single mother) and Maude. Good Times focused on working-class couple James and Florida Evans as they raised three kids while struggling with hard financial times, unemployment and keeping their kids away from temptations that came with living in a Chicago housing project. The movie will

Sony Pictures is in negotiations to turn Little House On The Prairie into a feature film that David Gordon Green will direct with Abi Morgan writing the script. Scott Rudin will produce with Trip Friendly. The deal hasn’t happened yet, but they are working toward giving the pioneer family a big screen incarnation. Little House On The Prairie is based on the semi-autobiographical classic children’s book series by Laura Ingalls Wilder written between 1932 and 1943 about farm life in the late 19th Century American West. The books formed the basis for a TV series that ran from 1974-1983 and starred Michael Landon , and Melissa Gilbert as Laura Ingalls Wilder. Morgan, last scripted the Steve McQueen-directed Michael Fassbender-starrer Shame, and the Phyllida Lloyd-directed The Iron Lady, which starred Meryl Streep. As for Green, he’s been focusing on comedies with Pineapple Express, The Sitter, Your Highness and Eastbound & Down. Please Leave A Comment-  Source- Deadline

Tom Hardy is in early talks to star in Everest for Sony Pictures. He will play George Mallory , the climber who tried three times in the 1920s to become the first man to scale the world’s highest mountain. Doug Liman will direct the film after he completes All You Need Is Kill at Warner Bros with Tom Cruise . An adaptation of Jeffrey Archer’s book Paths Of Glory, Everest has been adapted by Sheldon Turner (Up In The Air). Jennifer Klein is producing, and Dave Bartis, Liman’s partner at Hypnotic, will also be a producer. Liman, the Bourne Identity and Mr. And Mrs. Smith helmer who is himself an avid climber and fan of the Mallory story, has an actor who is a strong match for the intensity that burned in Mallory to get to the top of the mountain and beat another great climber, Australian George Finch (the grandfather of actor Peter Finch). Everest has been scaled many times since, but it is still dangerous–there are plenty of bodies near the final summit of those who got close b

Sony Pictures has just closed a deal for an untitled love story that Cameron Crowe will direct in the spring, with Emma Stone starring. Crowe wrote the script, and Scott Rudin is producing. The project is a two-hander, and that the male lead hasn’t yet been set, and that the tone is reminiscent of past Crowe films Almost Famous and Jerry Maguire. Stone just starred for the studio in The Amazing Spider-Man and completed Gangster Squad . Please Leave A Comment- Source- Deadline

Sabrina The Teenage Witch is getting a makeover at Sony Pictures . The precocious teen witch who originated in 60s Archie Comics, is being recast as a superhero. The live action film will be an origin story in the vein of Spider-Man , about a young girl coming to terms with her remarkable powers. Scribes Andrew Barrer & Gabriel Ferrari (they wrote Die In A Gunfight for MRC) will write the script, and Real Steel producers Don Murphy and Susan Montford are producing. Mark Waters, who worked on the presentation that Sony Pictures sparked to, might direct depending on scheduling. Archie Comics’ Jon Goldwater will be executive producer and screenwriter Jeff Stockwell, who also worked on the presentation, will be co-producer. Sabrina previously had been turned into animated tv series in 1969, 1971 and again in 1999 and the source material was turned into the Melissa Joan Hart sitcom that ran seven seasons. While the tone of the movie will be edgier, they are keeping her talking blac

In a seven-figure preemptive deal, Sony Pictures is collaborating with Ryan Murphy on One Hit Wonders, a musical comedy pitch that will be written as a star vehicle for Gwyneth Paltrow, Reese Witherspoon, Cameron Diaz, Beyonce and Andy Samberg . Murphy is attached to direct, and he will write the script with his Glee cohorts Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan. Murphy will produce with Paltrow (who has practically become a Glee cast member) and the latter makes her debut as a producer on this film. Murphy hopes to direct it after he completes The Normal Heart. Paltrow, Witherspoon and Diaz will play three singers who each scored a top hit song in the 1990s before watching their careers go down the drain. They decide to form a super group. Samberg and his Lonely Island cohorts will be involved in generating music for the film, I’m told. The project came out of a dinner Murphy had at the Soho House with Paltrow, Diaz and Witherspoon. They wanted to do something fun together and kicke

Sony Pictures has acquired a pitch from scribe Jason Keller for a period origin story on the Dracula mythology that will be produced by Joe Roth and Palak Patel. I’m hearing the deal was high six figures against seven-figures. It becomes the latest in a growing list of films about the iconic vampire borne out of the legend of Vlad the Impaler. There is also a new version of Dracula Year Zero that has risen from the grave with Gary Shore directing, Matt Sazama & Burk Sharpless writing and Moneyball‘s Mike De Luca producing. There is also an apocalyptic contemporary project coagulating that’s based on the book trilogy by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan that concluded with the recently released The Night Eternal, which Del Toro will set up when he completes Pacific Rim. And Keller himself is attached to another contemporary vampire film, adapting the Justin Cronin novel The Passage for Matt Reeves, in which government experiments on terminally ill people launches a plague of v

Sony Pictures has made a preemptive 7-figure deal for Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance co-director Brian Taylor to write and direct a live action adaptation of the iconic video game Twisted Metal . Ghost Rider’s Avi and Ari Arad are producing the adaptation of the game, which has been published in various configurations by Sony Computer and is one of the biggest selling video games. The newest version of the game was just released today for PlayStation 3. Avi Arad, of course, has been a producer of Sony’s Spider-Man films since the beginning, including the upcoming 3D The Amazing Spider-Man. All this action occurs as Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance opens this weekend, with Nicolas Cage reprising the title role and Idris Elba also starring. Like the game, the film will revolve around an underground event that pits a number of combatants in a fight to the death. They are outfitted in armored weaponized cars that are pimped out with heavy weaponry that includes missiles and machine

While the Republicans keep kicking Kathryn Bigelow and Mark Boal’s Bin Laden movie around like a political football, Annapurna Pictures and Sony Pictures are ready to get the mission underway. I’m told that Jessica Chastain, Mark Strong and Edgar Ramirez are circling to join the previously discussed ensemble cast of J ason Clarke, Joel Edgerton and Chris Pratt . The drama portrays Navy SEAL Team 6′s long hunt for the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. Osama Bin Laden was finally killed in a covert mission last year. Reports today assert that the Pentagon will investigate charges made by Rep Peter King that Oscar-winning The Hurt Locker tandem Bigelow and Boal somehow got inside information about the mission from the Obama Administration in preparing the script. This saber rattling hasn’t affected the film’s progress: the script is now finished and the film is going forward. Sony Pictures has dated the film for release on December 19, deliberately steering clear of the Presidential El

Break out the bug spray! Sony Pictures Über-producer Neal Moritz has decided that the time has come to reboot Paul Verhoeven's 1997 fascist classic Starship Troopers . He has assigned the script to screenwriters Ashley Edward Miller and Zack Stentz, who, among other things, wrote Thor and X-Men: First Class, as well as many episodes of the TV shows Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Fringe . Of course, they also wrote Agent Cody Banks, which makes one think that Frankie Muniz could be the perfect former child star to take over the Neil Patrick Harris role. A new Starship Troopers follows remake plans for Verhoeven's Total Recall and RoboCop. How long until his Basic Instinct and Showgirls get updated? Come to think of it, we could totally see Frankie Muniz in both of those, too. Please Leave A Comment- Source- Vulture

Sony Pictures will distribute the remake of Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead , which Fede Alvarez will direct in 2012, around the world, except in the U.K. and France. Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions and FilmDistrict negotiated the deal with Ghost House Pictures, which is producing the reboot. Rob Tapert, original franchise star Bruce Campbell and Raimi are producing. Ghost House partners Joe Drake and Nathan Kahane are executive producers. “Sony Pictures has a fantastic history collaborating with both Ghost House and FilmDistrict and we couldn’t be more excited to continue working together on the contemporary adaptation of Evil Dead,” said Jeff Blake, chairman of Sony Pictures worldwide marketing and distribution. “Sam and Rob have an extraordinary vision and we can’t wait to share this film with audiences in most territories throughout the world.” Hewing close in plot to the original released in 1981, the new Evil Dead follows what happens when five friends in a remote cabin

Doug Liman has climbed aboard Everest, a Sony Pictures drama about George Mallory and his three attempts in the early 1920s to become the first man to climb the world’s highest mountain. The film, an adaptation of Jeffrey Archer’s book Paths Of Glory , has a script by Sheldon Turner. Jennifer Klein is producing. Liman has several projects percolating, including Luna, a moon mission film that Paramount Pictures and New Regency are trying to make work, as well as Warner Bros’ Dante Harper-scripted drama All You Need Is Kill. Liman, who directed the action hits The Bourne Identity and Mr. and Mrs. Smith , is himself an avid climber and a fan of the Mallory story. He is in the midst of a deal to supervise the next draft by Turner with the intention to direct a film that is a priority at Sony Pictures. The film is about Mallory’s burning obsession to climb to the top of Mount Everest, and a rivalry with another great climber, Australian George Finch (the grandfather of actor Peter Finc

Whitney Houston , making her first return to movies since 1996’s The Preacher’s Wife , is in negotiations to star in Sparkle , Sony Pictures remake of the 1976 music-themed drama. American Idol winner Jordin Sparks and actor Mike Epps also are set to star. Mara Brock Akil, who created and executive produces BET's hit comedy The Game , wrote the script while husband Salim Akil, who has helmed every episode of Game and many episodes of the UPN hit Girlfriends, is directing. Debra Martin Chase is producing with TD Jakes, the Akils and Curtis Wallace. The original Sparkle was inspired by the story of the Supremes , and centered on the three Williams sisters, who begin singing in their church choir in Harlem in the late 1950s and become a successful girl group. Their sudden rise unravels their personal lives. Sparks will play the title character, the talented member of the group while Houston will play her not-so encouraging mother. Epps will be Satin, a stand-up comedia

Dam you Hollywood another remake on the way. Ben Ripley, who most recently penned Source Code , has been signed to a development deal with Sony to write a contemporary reimagining of Flatliners , the 1990 Joel Schumacher drama about medical students who dabble too far into near-death experiments that starred then-emerging actors like Kiefer Sutherland, Julia Roberts and William Baldwin, as well as Kevin Bacon . Maybe Sony thinks a redo can launch a few more young careers in the same manner? Laurence Mark is set to produce, likely with Further Films, for Columbia Pictures. David Blackman is overseeing for Laurence Mark Prods. Ripley penned the April release Source Code for Summit Entertainment; the film was a surprise hit and has made $123.3 million worldwide to date. Please Leave A Comment- Source- Deadline

Sony is the latest studio to jump into the black ops game, picking up Shadow Runner , an original thriller with Chris Hemsworth attached to star. Plot details are being kept secret although it is known it involves elite commandos. The project is based on an original idea from Hossein Amini, who is one of the writers of Snow White and the Huntsman , which also stars Hemsworth. Hemsworth is best known for his star-turning performance as Thor, a character he will reprise in next summer’s The Avengers. He worked with Vinson and Flynn on the duo’s remake of Red Dawn. Amini, who will also executive produce Shadow Runner, is the writer of Drive, the buzzed-about movie starring Ryan Gosling and directed by Nicolas Winding Refn. Please Leave A Comment- Source- Heatvision

I was very much surprised by the film Salt , and with the film grossing around $300 million worldwide it's no surprise that Sony Pictures is moving forward on its much speculated Salt sequel. Kurt Wimmer has begun writing it for Angelina Jolie to reprise her role as Evelyn Salt, the CIA agent who spent the first movie running for her life after being outed as a Russian spy. The studio smartly left open a window for a possible sequel at the climax of the original, which was directed by Phillip Noyce. Now, Universal Pictures tried to draft a sequel of Wanted and it didn't happen. This is different. Jolie wants to do the Salt sequel if it comes together right. I'm told that Wimmer has officially signed on and is working away. The original grossed around $300 million worldwide for Sony Pictures. Please Leave A Comment- Source- Deadline

We all knew that 007 's new outing would be hitting cinema screens in late 2012. But Sony have today confirmed that Bond 23 - the intriguing working title for, erm, Bond 23 - will be released on October 26 of next year, and not November, the traditional slot for Bond. It's good to see that Daniel Craig 's Bond is keeping the British end up - In Europe they will see the film two weeks before it is releases in the USA. The films opens in the US on November 9th. Oh, and we sincerely hope that Bond 23 is the actual title of the film. How ballsy would that be? Please Leave A Comment- Source- Empire

What has happened with Sony Pictures' plans to mount an exciting new biopic of Cleopatra , with Angelina Jolie attached as the Egyptian queen, based on Stacy Schiff's bestselling book Cleopatra: A Life ? I'm told the director conversation right now is with David Fincher , who just got a Best Director Oscar nomination working with Cleopatra producer Scott Rudin, and who is working with Rudin on the Stieg Larsson novel adaptation The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo , also at Sony Pictures. I spoke to James Cameron in December and he let me know that he was not doing the film. until 20th Century Fox stepped up and got him to commit instead to two Avatar sequels. After that, speculation centered around Paul Greengrass, who wound up instead directing his own script, Memphis, about the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., for Universal, also with Rudin producing. It's not surprising that the top directors in town are after this gig. As Rudin has described it, this is t

Jonah Hill is in talks to make his feature directorial debut on The Kitchen Sink , the Oren Uziel script for Sony Pictures about the unlikely alliance between a high school-aged vampire, zombie and human as they try to save their town from invading aliens. The script was a top choice on the recently released 2010 Black List. Matt Tolmach is producing, and it was one of the first projects his company acquired after he left his executive job and jumped right in to produce the Spider-Man reboot with Laura Ziskin and Avi Arad. Hill is hot stuff at Sony, co-writing 21 Jump Street , and co-starring in the transfer of the Fox TV drama alongside Channing Tatum and Ice Cube , with Phil Lord and Chris Miller directing. Hill also co-starred with Brad Pitt in Moneyball , the Bennett Miller-directed adaptation of the Michael Lewis book about Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane. That script was written by Steve Zaillian and gets released September 23 by Sony. The title The Kitchen

Ice Cube is negotiating to join Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum in 21 Jump Street . In 21 Jump Street, Cube will play the precinct captain role originated by Steven Williams in the TV series that launched the career of Johnny Depp . Ice Cube To Play Precinct Captain In 21 Jump Street Movie?  Phil Lord and Chris Miller are directing the pic for Sony Pictures. Cube livens up the cast, but if they are planning to replicate the series plot about undercover cops that infiltrate schools, I'm still waiting to see if they cast anybody that remotely looks like they might be proofed in a bar. Depp was a baby-faced 24 when he started the series: Tatum is 30 and Hill is 27. Shooting begins in late April and Neal Moritz is producing. Cube will jump into that film after he finishes a role in the New Line romancer New Year's Eve , matched with Hilary Swank. Cube, who directed the 2010 Oakland Raiders documentary Straight Outta L.A. for ESPN, hasn't directed a narrative feature sin