S. J. Clarkson Early Fave To Helm Next ‘Star Trek’

Paramount Pictures has begun propulsion power on the fourth Star Trek film initiated by Bad Robot. S.J. Clarkson is now negotiating to become the first woman to helm a film in the vaunted Trek series. The British director just helmed the David Hare-scripted Collateral with Carey Mulligan starring for Netflix. She also directed the pilots of Marvel’s Jessica Jones and The Defenders for Netflix, and her TV helming credits also include episodes of Vinyl, Dig and Orange Is the New Black. She’s repped by WME and Curtis Brown.

This would continue a memorable month for women directors in the scifi/superhero realm. Last week, Victoria Mahoney was named second unit director on JJ Abrams next Star Wars: Episode IX, and Cathy Yan got the job directing the next Harley Quinn film, after being championed by Margot Robbie and her co-producer Sue Kroll to direct the Suicide Squad spinoff based on the Birds of Prey storyline, which is a gang of female heroes.

Paramount’s Jim Gianopulos touted two Trek films. One is the film that Quentin Tarantino hatched with Abrams for an R-rated Trek film. That is being scripted by The Revenant scribe Mark L. Smith. The second, and the one where Clarkson’s name surfaced last week — the studio denied she had been set at that point — brings back the Enterprise crew in a storyline that will involve Chris Pine’s Captain Kirk and his father, who is being played by Chris Hemsworth, who played the role in a cameo flashback scene in 2009’s Star Trek.

Tarantino is about to start production on Once Upon A Time in Hollywood with Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt and likely Margot Robbie for Sony Pictures. So Clarkson will be steering the next Trek picture to go into production.