Colin Farrell: Untrue Detective
Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
A Cover Story on Colin Farrell’s Untrue Detective.
In The Industry News, Rugrats come to life, Amazon MGM wins a duel and a Day of Fire.
Actor Spotlight: Sophie Turner is a thief, John Boyega gets musical, and Jack Quaid is a bad companion.
Indie Filmmaker Spotlight: Get lost in the labyrinths of Marc Turtletaub and Oren Moverman, and Magazine Dreams become reality.
Let’s go!
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Colin Farrell is back playing a detective in Apple TV+’s Sugar, just renewed for Season 2.
In the first season, Farrell plays John Sugar, a detective who comes into LA from way out of town and has an infatuation with old Hollywood detective films.
The series went so far as to intercut B&W clips of Bogie in The Maltese Falcon (1941), Dead Reckoning (1946), and In a Lonely Place (1950) into the show as Farrell cruised around LA in his crystal blue 1966 Chevrolet Stingray Corvette.
Here’s the official teaser synopsis of Sugar Season 2:
Sugar is back in Los Angeles, taking on another missing persons case as he continues to look for answers surrounding his missing sister.
Farrell has an innate ability to play all sides of the detective stereotype.
In Sugar, he plays a cool detective with a heart of gold, which shares some DNA (mostly the cool factor) with his undercover detective in Miami Vice (2006), tasked with infiltrating a drug ring.
In Minority Report (2002), he's mercilessly uptight as an agent from the US Justice Department sent to investigate pre-crime.
Farrell’s violent side was brought out in Pride and Glory (2008), portraying an ultra-corrupt cop, a performance that weighed on him:
“I don't feel the violence in the film is gratuitous. Gratuitous is violence without any cost, without seeing the weight of it and how it affects people negatively if it's there solely for kicks and entertainment purposes. With this in mind, we have a scene that stretches the realms of responsibility vs. irresponsibility in film, it was that egregious. But I felt it was essential to show the level of desperation this character had got at and what he would do.”
Farrell’s previous turn as a (traumatized) detective came in the very violent, much-hated True Detective Season 2.
Farrell's Sugar is impressive because it stretched beyond the genre confines, becoming much more interesting after Sugar revealed his earth-shattering secret (a twist I actually predicted… although I’m sure no one will believe me.)
No word on production dates.
For More:
Sugar Season 1 trailer.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
It's about to get uncanny in this Rugrats Live Action Movie: A live-action/CGI hybrid adaptation of Rugrats, the iconic 1990s Nickelodeon cartoon, is being developed with Pitch Perfect director Jason Moore at the helm.
The film will be based on a script co-written by Saturday Night Live star Mikey Day and Streeter Seidell. All of this, in theory, sounds fine; the original Rugrats movies were fun (as a 90's kid). There was a very event-like feel to them heightened by the kind of gross scratch-a-sniff-along card that was given as a promo.
The movies did a good job of heightening the stakes and introducing new fun adventures—hell, there were even some earworms. But what is worrying is the promise of a "Hybrid" CGI live-action situation.
I don't think studios have really quite nailed that since Roger Rabbit. I also see the very 90's objectively ugly designs of the babies, and I imagine them CGI-ified, and I shudder. But I acquiesce; maybe Rugrats are now just not for me, a human adult man.
No word yet on release date yet. A baby's gotta do, what a baby's gotta do.
Amazon MGM outduels and wins a hot spec script. Very little is known about Outdueled other than that it has franchise potential and is getting fast-tracked to production.
Here are the attachments:
Writer: F. Scott Frazier (xXx: Return of Xander Cage)
Writer: Jimmy Loweree (Dave Bautista's upcoming Universe's Most Wanted)
Production Company: Escape Artists (The Equalizer series, Pig),
Additional producers: Jonathan Shukat (Nicolas Cage’s Madden)
The price for the action adventure script, is supposedly astronomical.
Tibdit:
Nickel Boys gets Amazon’s Oscar treatment. It will release in New York on December 13 and Los Angeles on December 20. They pushed the release date from the original NY Oct 25/LA Nov 1 to bolster its Oscar chances and to make new 35mm prints after the film had fantastic reviews when it premiered at Telluride and now NYFF. Match this with Amazon MGM’s release for American Fiction last year, which took the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. That was released in NY on Dec 15, then moved to LA, and then expanded wide.
Here’s a quick breakdown of Nickel Boys:
Dir: RaMell Ross
Star: Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (King Richard) and Hamish Linklater (Midnight Mass)
Distributor: Orion Pictures (Amazon MGM)
The Nickel Boys trailer nails the first-person POV impressionistic images. Click here to read more on why the film is tracking as an Oscar front-runner: https://theindustry.co/p/oscars-begin
A Day of Fire: A Novel of Pompeii is being adapted into a limited series for Amazon MGM Studios with Ridley Scott’s Scott Free Productions.
The book takes place in the lead up to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which utterly destroyed Pompeii and killed many of its residents. It tells a series of overlapping stories of residents there and what their lives were like before fire rained down.
Horatio and Michael Hirst (Vikings) are set to EP, write, and show run.
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700 casting professionals ratified a three-year deal with AMPTP.
Term and Scope:
Agreement from Oct 1, 2024, to Sept 30, 2027.
Casting Assistants added to bargaining unit.
Wages:
Weekly minimum rates established for Casting Directors.
Casting Assistants: $21/hour (2024), increasing annually to $22.60 (2026).
31% wage increase for Associate Casting Directors over the term.
Casting Directors minimums (Pilots/First Episodes): $7,000 (2024), $7,280
Additional Provisions:
Juneteenth was added as a holiday in 2025.
Sick leave for employees outside California.
Lindsay Dougherty, the lead negotiator and head of Local 399 stated:
“Our Casting Teamsters have always been fighters. Since their original fight for representation in 2006 to now, this group continues to stand united and work collaboratively to understand how to better advocate for the art and craft of Casting, as well as the livelihood of those working in this career,”
The agreement was ratified by 91.85 %.
You Shall not Pass (Season 1 hype): Amazon reports The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2 reached 55 million global viewers in 34 days, a big accomplishment, but stymied by slower growth compared to Season 1. Viewership debuted on Nielsen’s Top 10 with one billion minutes watched, less than Season 1's 1.3 billion-minute debut.
The season finale for Rings of Power season 2 will air today (Thursday.)
One of the doctors in Matthew Perry’s death, Mark Chavez, has pleaded guilty. He faces ten years in prison.
Read more on the tragic case and the five people charged:
https://theindustry.co/p/nicolas-cages-silver-lining
Read more about Perry’s incredible life and battle with addiction here:
https://theindustry.co/p/matthew-perry-sylvester-stallone-a-cactus
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Sophie Turner is a thief. The Game of Thrones actress leads CW’s Joan as the titular character.
Here’s the official synopsis:
A woman who goes between her thriving and daring career as a jewel thief, all whilst trying to get her daughter back from social services, we see a mother in despair swept up in the exhilarating world of crime.
What’s so great about this is her oscillation between effortless coolness as a thief and heartwrenching concern as a mother, on full display in the trailer.
Click to see first-look images of Turner in her disguises:
The series kicked off yesterday on the CW and the first episode is available for free on their website.
The musical biopics just keep coming! Star Wars’ John Boyega is set to play Otis Redding, a legendary soul artist often regarded as one of the greatest singer-songwriters in the history of American music. Otis & Zelma will tell the eternal love story of the singer’s decade-long relationship with his wife played by BAFTA nominated actress Danielle Deadwyler (Till) Fifth Season’s forthcoming feature. From director Channing Godfrey Peoples (Miss Juneteenth) with a script penned by screenwriter Donnetta Lavinia Grays (Happy!).
Redding’s career was tragically cut short by a plane crash at the age of 26, leaving Velma and their three kids behind. The singer has too many hit songs to list all of which stood the test of time, including:
(Sittin’ On) Thee Dock of the Bay (1968)
Hard to Handle (1968)
These Arms of Mine (1964)
Boyega has shown his range in films like in Netflix’s They Cloned Tyrone (2023, trailer), playing multiple parts, including the titular role or as the lovable Finn in the more recent Star Wars sequel trilogy beginning with The Force Awakens (2015, trailer), yet I’m not sure if we’ve ever heard the actor sing or seen him in this type of role before. His screen partner Deadwyler has experience in biopic films even set within the same time period, having most notably played Mamie Till in the civil rights biographical drama Till (2022, trailer).
News of the Otis & Velma film comes just before Redding will be posthumously honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Oct. 4th.
Robbie Williams: What's with the Monkey?: A party animal if you will, not a ton of nuance in that, but that's a commodity increasingly becoming scarce in the flurry of Biopics. Younger Americans hear Take That (Robbie Williams band) and say “who's that,” but those who grew up with the top of the pops are all too familiar with Robbie Williams and the boy band that spawned then spurned him.
A simple analog would be Justin Timberlake's career trajectory but more British. Are we all on the same page now?
Adding one more wrinkle in Better Man, Robbie is played by a CGI monkey, really milking all of the Planet of Apes tech for all it's got.
The trailer does not really show why that is or explain, just that he's "always seen himself a little less evolved." Then it's just a fair bit of run of the mill biopic scenes, drugs, parties, heartbreak, but a monkey wearing a jacket.
All of this being said, as upsetting as a viewer might find a human-monkey hybrid, it does look nice, the shots are interesting, and Paramount saw this at the festival and thought it would make money buying it for a record $25M. Better Man arrives on January 15, 2025, where it may do poorly in America but should see some returns overseas. Just like Robbie, to be honest.
See the familiar trailer: The Rise, the Fall… but as a monkey.
Tidbits:
Jack Quaid is one sick F*** in Companion. In his new film, he seems to be getting off on torturing his robot slave. The film is being produced by Zach Cregger (dir: Barbarians) and Distributed by Warner Bros. (The Notebook). So, a match made in heaven, given Quaid’s proclivity to get drenched in blood in The Boys. Companion slams into theaters on Jan 10th.
Oscar winner Halle Berry lands lead role opposite Chris Hemsworth (Furiosa) in Amazon MGM’s upcoming thriller feature, Crime 101. The anticipated film from writer-director Bart Layton is adapted from Don Winslow’s 2021 short story of the same name and will feature, in addition to Berry and Hemsworth, actors Mark Ruffalo (Spotlight) and Barry Keoghan (Saltburn). Filming for Crime 101 is expected to start this month, with a premiere date of sometime next year.
Kevin Williamson’s The Waterfront has found a new resident in That 70’s Show star Topher Grace set to join forthcoming eight episode Netflix family drama. Universal Television (where Williamson has an overall deal) is behind the upcoming show which will see Grace as a shrewd and intense man looking to get involved in business with the crumbling Buckley family. No word yet on when it will drop on the streamer.
Ready to Form: Newcomer Daniel Quinn-Toye will star in Amazon MGM’s live-action Voltron, directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber and set to film in Australia. Quinn-Toye will make his debut. His biggest credit since has been on stage where he was Tom Holland's understudy for his run in Romeo and Juliet. Voltrong, is based on the 1980s anime Voltron: Defender of the Universe, the adaptation follows five pilots commanding Robot Lions that form the mega-robot Voltron.
There was a lot of small robots make a big robot, some good early anime kaiju goodness.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT
Little Miss Sunshine (2006) producer Marc Turtletaub is teaming up with The Messanger screenwriter Oren Moverman for Borges and Me.
This is an adaptation of Jay Parini’s 2020 memoir on his 1970s trip through the Scottish Highlands with Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. Turtletaub will direct the film from Moverman’s screenplay.
Official Synopsis:
Parini, a 23-year old shy student who dreams of becoming a writer, finds himself stuck in chauffeuring the brilliant blind Borges, aged 70, through Scotland. At first, Parini is at a loss to make sense of the wild, irrepressible Borges. Their journey, much like a Borges story, takes a surreal turn that amplifies their differences until, in the tradition of a classic road movie, the two find common ground.
I’m going to go out on a limb here, and this is because I have massive respect for Turtletaub as a producer and massive respect for Oren Moverman as a writer/director, who I’ve been lucky to chat with on a few occasions, and I say something feels off.
Borges was the master of the absurd.
I binged his short story collection Labyrinths which contains some of the most philosophically perfect puzzles ever committed to the page like Library of Babel, The Lottery of Babylon and Death and the Compass.
Now I don’t think a Borges project should automatically slide into Chris Nolan’s DMs but form must follow function, such as in the Beckett biopic Dance First that featured an abstract space with two Becketts (both played by Gabriel Bryne).
I have no quandaries about Moverman's ability to take us into the absurd; in fact, his underrated The Dinner (2017) did just that.
It’s just Turtletaub has directed almost entirely understated films Puzzle (2018) and even the Ben Kinglsey-led sci-fi dramedy Jules (2023).
But of course, I’m a big fan of both of these filmmakers and will reserve (any more blind) judgment until the film releases.
Borges & Me will star Dunkirk (2017) actor Fionn Whitehead as young Parini and Neruda’s Luis Gnecco as Borges. The film has started production in Scotland.
Magazine Dreams, the boxing film that premiered at Sundance to strong reviews, but got pulled from its Searchlight release due to Jonathan Majors's involvement has found a new distributor: Briarcliff Entertainment.
It will play in early 2025, nearly two years after its Sundance premiere.
Briarcliff’s founder Tom Ortenberg, former Lionsgate President, has a history of producing hot-button films:
Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)
Dir: Michael Moore
Won: Cannes Palme d’Or
Tom’s Role: President of the distribution company, Lionsgate
Spotlight (2015)
Won: Academy Award Best Picture
Tom’s Role: EP/President of distributor Open Road Films
Snowden (2016)
Tom’s Role: EP/President of distributor Open Road Films
The Apprentice
Trump biopic
Premiere: Cannes
Tom’s Role: President of the distribution company
Ortenberg stated:
“Magazine Dreams is a visceral experience that challenges the perceptions of ambition and identity… Jonathan Majors’ transcendent performance as Killian Maddox will undoubtedly be remembered as one of the most compelling and transformative roles in recent cinema history,”
I was kicking myself for missing tickets to this at Sundance, so I’m jazzed that this will see the light of day.
Film Nation (International sales rep) and CAA Media (Domestic sales rep) score big for Dir: Derek Cianfrance’s (Blue Valentine) latest Roofman.
Miramax will distribute domestically and internationally, with Paramount helping.
Here’s a breakdown of the film:
Cast: Kirsten Dunst, Channing Tatum
Production Company: Limelight (Palm Springs)
Official synopsis:
The story of the rooftop robber, Jeffrey Manchester, and his time evading capture.
Read our cover story on the project, a return to form for Cianfrance: https://theindustry.co/p/blue-valentine-to-toys-r-us
Venice Special Jury Prize winner April (dir: Dea Kulumbegashvili) has found distribution with Metrograph.
Metrograph president, David Laub, a former A24 exec, stated:
April is a bold, brilliant, completely original piece of cinema unlike anything we have ever seen… While dealing with tremendously important and relevant modern issues, it transcends easy categorization and instead proves to be one the most unique and thrillingly unclassifiable films ever made.”
He called the film a masterpiece.
Synopsis:
Nina, an OB-GYN, faces accusations after newborn's death. Her life undergoes scrutiny during investigation. She persists in her medical duties, determined to provide care others hesitate to offer, despite risks.
Clip.
The first film Metrograph acquired for theatrical release after Laub became president was Good One, which made $314K at the box office, opening with a per screen average of $10K across three theaters.
April will be released theatrically next year.
Tidbit:
Well Go USA (Kit Harrington’s The Beast Within) snags North American rights for the sci-fi romance Daniela Forever, which premiered at TIFF. The film stars Beatrice Grannò stole every scene in The White Lotus season 2 (still) and Henry Golding (Crazy Rich Asians).
Releasing early 2025.
ON THIS DAY
1941. The Maltese Falcon directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor, premieres in New York City.
See you Friday!
Written by Gabriel Miller, Spencer Carter, and Madelyn Menapace.
Editor: Gabriel Miller.