Rashida Jones’s Sun, Anthony Hopkins’s Reign

Good morning: In today’s edition of The Industry, we look at:

Black Mirror Rashida Jones, Emmys 2024 diet, Stephen Kings’s peace and quiet, Michael Fassbender takes one for the team and a summer solstice.

Let’s go!

THE INDUSTRY NEWS

Nominations-round voting has begun for the Emmys. The double strike last year affected the number of TV shows being produced and, thus, the number of shows submitted.

Here’s a breakdown:

Best Drama series:

• 2022
  • 171 submissions
• 2023
  • 163 submissions
• 2024
  • 107 submissions

Best Comedy series:

• 2022
  • 118 submissions
• 2023
  • 95 submissions
• 2024
  • 73 submissions

Best Limited or Anthology series:

• 2022
  • 61 submissions
• 2023
  • 51 submissions
• 2024
  • 49 submissions

That’s a 33% reduction overall from 2023.

Down the ballot, the number of nominations is correlated to the total number of submissions, thus there will be a reduction in the number of nominations.

In the Best Writing and Best Directing categories, we’re pulling for The Bear‘s Fishes episode (the wild Christmas episode).

MGM+ launches a limited series based on Stephen King’s novel, The Institute. Here’s the breakdown:

• The Institute
  • Starring: ​Mary-Louise Parker​ (Weeds, Red)
  • Starring: ​Ben Barnes​ (The Chronicles of Narnia)
  • Director/EP: ​Jack Bender​ (Lost)
  • Writer/EP: ​Benjamin Cavell​ (Justified)

Official Synopsis:

When 12-year-old genius Luke Ellis is kidnapped, he awakens at The Institute, a facility full of children who all got there the same way he did, and who are all possessed of unusual abilities. In a nearby town, haunted former police officer Tim Jamieson (Barnes) has come looking to start a new life, but the peace and quiet won’t last, as his story and Luke’s are destined to collide.

The head of MGM+, Michael Wright stated:

This has been the third greenlit adaptation of Stephen King’s novel in the last few months as his work is seen as bankable IP:

• ​The Long Walk​
  • Starring Cooper Hoffman (Licorice Pizza)
  • Dir: Francis Lawrence (Hunger Games 2-5)
  • Production Company: Lionsgate
• ​The Monkey​
  • Dir: Oz Perkins (Longlegs)
  • Starring Theo James
  • Distributor: Neon

The Institute will begin production in Nova Scotia this year.

Amazon MGM Studios announced ​The 500​ (IMDBPro link) adaptation based on the bestselling novel by Matthew Quirk (The Night Agent).

Specializing in thrillers involved in the world of politics, government, espionage, and corruption, Quirk’s 2019 novel The Night Agent (2019) was adapted into a popular Netflix series currently in production on its second season.

His sophomore show adaptation, The 500 will follow a former con artist plucked from his Harvard Law School classroom to become an associate at Washington’ most high-powered consulting firm. Quickly pulled into a seductive, dangerous web of power and corruption, he struggles to find his way out.

​Andrew Sodroski​ (Manhunt) is attached as the showrunner, EP, and writer of The 500.

Tidbits:

Watchmen comic releases its trailer for a two-part animated adaptation of Alan Moore’s masterful graphic novel. The dark, gritty take on superheroes has become a cultural milestone with Amazon’s The Boys, Netflix’s Jupiter Legacy, and, in some ways, the also animated Invincible. But Watchman was arguably where someone looked into humanity under the mask and usually pulled away something darker and deeply flawed. While Zack Snyder created a beautifully shot interpretation, some of that flash to many fans obscured the real message.

And the follow-up TV show, while competent and interesting, was more like a sequel dealing directly with the consequences laid forth in Moore’s world. With this two-part R-rated retelling, Warner Bro’s looks to give original work its barest interpretation.

​Trailer here​.

Part one will be released in 2024, and part Two in 2025.

Apple TV+ trailer drop extraordinaire:

• ​The Instigators​
  • Dir: Doug Liman
  • Starring: Matt Damon, Casey Affleck
  • Featuring: Ron Perlman

Logline:

Two robbers must go on the run with the help of one of their therapists after a theft doesn’t go as planned.

​Trailer​.

Here’s our ​cover story​ on Damon and Liman reuniting 20 years after Bourne Identity.

• ​Sunny​
  • Starring: Rashida Jones (Parks and Rec, The Office)
  • Production Company: A24

Logline:

An American woman living in Japan, and Sunny, a domestic robot made by her husband’s company, as they uncover the dark truth of what really happened to Suzie’s husband and son, who disappeared in a mysterious plane crash

​Trailer​.

Sunny has a beautiful Black Mirror vibe with a tinge of the macabre towards the end of the trailer.

​Derek Conoly​ tapped to direct the Transformers – G.I. Joe crossover movies writer of both Jurassic World (2015) and Indie Spirit Award-winning indie darling Safety Not Guaranteed (​trailer​).

THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT

Grace Van Patten​ to reunite with Hulu as the star of a new untitled limited series from creator K.J. Steinberg (writer: The Last of Us).

Van Patten will portray ​Amanda Knox​, the real woman wrongfully convicted for the murder of her roommate in 2007 in the eight-episode series. Knox was ultimately acquitted but the horrific circumstances recall HBO’s The Night Of.

The young New York native recently played another character whose roommate died in Hulu’s Tell Me Lies (2022-, ​trailer​) which came shortly after her appearance in her third Hulu collaboration alongside Melissa McCarthy and Nicole Kidman in the drama Nine Perfect Strangers (2021).

The Knox-centered untitled project is set to start filming in October.

The original Wednesday Adams herself, Christina Ricci, to star in the new true crime series ​Chop Shop​ with Midnight Mass actor Hamish Linklater.

Inspired by the Kathy Braidhill book of the same name, the series will chart the chilling and twisted tale of the Lamb Funeral Home in 1980s Los Angeles.

Official synopsis:

The Lamb Funeral Home’s new owner David Sconce (Linklater) leads his family into a dark path as they descend from a respectable facade to human body harvesting and mass cremation in 1980s Los Angeles.

Screenwriter Andy Bellin known for Lovelace (2013) is writing.

Ricci will play an investigative journalist based on the author Kathy Braidhill, a familiar role for the actress’ repertoire as she typically takes on curious female characters in dark and mysterious circumstances in most of her TV and film appearances:

• Yellowjackets (2021)
  • Ricci stars as the unpredictable loner Misty Quigley
  • ​Trailer​
• Wednesday (2022)
  • The first season’s teacher antagonist, Ms. Thornhill
  • ​Clip​

Producers of the project Laura Rister and Michael Rosenberg said:

Chop Shop is currently looking for showrunners and directors to complete the package for networks.

Tidbits:

Hunter Schafer has been cast in Blade Runner 2099 alongside Michelle Yeoh. Schafer made her acting debut by ​dissecting​ her insecurities in Euphoria. She infused the role of a trans-high-schooler with lacerating authenticity. No word on who Schafer will play in Blade Runner 2099.

Anthony Hopkins is the emperor of Rome. Hopkins stars in the new Peacock drama Those About to Die, co-directed by Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow). Here’s a first-look ​trailer​. Streaming July 18th.

Emily Blunt is in talks to star in Steven Spielberg’s next film about UFOs. Spielberg has always been obsessed with extraterrestrials, as detailed in our Steven Spielberg’s Space Odyssey ​cover story​.

Idris Elba and Rebecca Ferguson are circling Kathryn Bigelow’s next film. Synopsis: The White House’s real-time response efforts to an incoming ballistic missile attack on American soil. Elba’s performance in Hijack seems particularly well-tuned for panic diplomacy, and Ferguson just displayed a heightened sense of insanity in Dune 2. Both will be great in whatever roles they land.

FESTIVALS AND RESOURCES

Tribeca Winners:

Best Narrative Feature/Best Screenplay:

• ​Griffin in Summer​
  • Dir/Writer: ​Nicholas Colia​

Synopsis:

Fourteen-year-old Griffin Nafly is the most ambitious playwright of his generation. But once he meets handsome twenty-five-year-old handyman Brad, his life (and play) will never be the same.

Jury statement:

This is Colia’s feature debut.

Best International Narrative Feature:

• ​Bikechess​
  • Dir: ​Assel Aushakimova​ (Kazakhstan)

Synopsis:

Disenchanted Kazakh journalist Dina balances supporting her activist lesbian sister while navigating a relationship with her married cameraman.

Jury statement:

The ​poster​ is very fun.

Check out the full list of Tribeca winners ​here​.

The ​Entertainment Community Fund​, formerly known as The Actors Fund, has an ​emergency financial assistance program​ that gives grants to performing arts workers in entertainment who are unable to pay their basic living expenses, such as housing, food, utility, and healthcare costs.

INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT

Summer Solstice shines a light on the shifting romantic dynamics between a trans man and their straight friend during a retreat.

Here’s the official synopsis:

Leo, a trans man, and his cis and straight friend, Eleanor, go away for an impromptu weekend trip, during which they uncover old secrets, new challenges, and find the answer to the age-old question: can bad sex and good friends mix?

What’s excellent in the ​trailer​ is how Leo (Bobbi Salvör Menuez, Under the Silver Lake) is perceived by Eleanor, who has not seen him since he began transitioning. There’s a fake sincerity that primes us for a tidal force reckoning.

Summer Solstice (dir: ​Noah Schamus​) received Panavision’s New Filmmaker Program grant and was included in the 2021 Outfest Screenwriting Lab.

Tidbit:

IFC buys ​​Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point​​, starring Michael Cera, Francesca Scorsese, and Maria Dizzia.

Synopsis:

On Christmas Eve, a family gathers for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, one of the teenagers sneaks out with her friends to claim the wintry suburb for her own. ​

First look photo of ​Cera​ as a storm-battered cop.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Kneecap crashed into Sundance hard and just dropped their first trailer. The film was the first acquisition out of the festival, picked up by Sony Pictures Classics.

Here’s the official synopsis:

When fate brings Belfast teacher JJ into the orbit of self-confessed ‘low life scum’ Naoise and Liam Og, the needle drops on a hip-hop act like no other. Rapping in their native Irish, they lead a movement to save their mother tongue.

I got to see the film at the festival and it has a sharp anarchist bent that has some of the energy of Trainspotting (1996) and a completely baffling B-plot with Micahel Fassbender. Either way, you can’t but feel excited by the live wire energy of the rap trio.

The first ​trailer​ just dropped. Turn it to 11.

Release date August 2nd.

ON THIS DAY

2002. The Bourne Identity, directed by Doug Liman and starring Matt Damon, is released in the US.

That’s all for the week. See you Monday.

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Written by Gabriel Miller, Spencer Carter, and Madelyn Menapace.

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Editor: ​Gabriel Miller​.