Alcon Entertainment has acquired film and TV rights to young adult zombie fiction series Rot & Ruin from New York Times best-selling author Jonathan Maberry. Alcon purchased all five installments of Simon & Schuster’s Rot & Ruin and plans to develop the first book for the big screen. Rot & Ruin follows Benny Imura as…

The Emperor's New Groove and Chicken Little helmer Mark Dindal is set to direct a Garfield animated feature set up Alcon Entertainment, which acquired the rights from the creator Jim Davis, who will serve as an exec producer. Paul Kaplan and Mark Torgove co-wrote the screenplay. Debuting in 1978, the Garfield comic…

EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off the huge Mexican box office opening of his comedy Ya Veremos, Mauricio Ochmann is joining Mexican comedian Omar Chaparro (No Manches Frida) in Spanish-language comedy Backseat Driver. Pantelion Films, 3Pas Studios, and Alcon Entertainment are producing the pic, which starts production in Mexico…

Those traveling pants sure do get around. Alcon Entertainment and Alloy Entertainment announced plans today to develop The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants film franchise as a stage musical. Blue Spruce Productions, led by theatrical producer Scott Delman, has acquired the live theatrical rights from Alcon and Alloy…

Queen Latifah has been set to topline Hope’s Wish, an inspirational drama based on a true story from the Blade Runner 2049 team of Alcon Entertainment and Torridon/16:14, along with Walden Media. Laurie Collyer will direct the film, which begins production April 9 in Charlotte, NC. Adapted by Brokeback Mountain…

Alcon Entertainment said today there will be layoffs as part of a restructuring of the production and finance company. The news comes after its big tentpole effort Blade Runner 2049 underperformed at the box office, as did the Owen Wilson-Ed Helms comedy Father Figures. Alcon co-founders and co-CEOs Broderick Johnson…

For Part 1 of our weekend analysis on what went wrong with Blade Runner 2049, please click here. UPDATE, Monday 3:46 PM: Alcon Entertainment and Sony’s flying car noir sequel Blade Runner 2049 via Warner Bros looks to come in around $36.7 million over the four-day Columbus Day holiday per industry estimates, still not…

For Part 2 of our weekend analysis of what went wrong with Blade Runner 2049 please click here. Writethru Sunday AM: What a fascinating business. This weekend a $35 million-budgeted horror movie in its fifth frame will gross close to nine times its production cost with a running domestic B.O. total of $304.5M. At the…

It is hard to believe it has been 35 years since Ridley Scott’s groundbreaking and, as it turned out, enormously influential 1982 noirish sci-fi landmark Blade Runner. That movie was only intended to be a one-off and not a franchise, but the world being as screwed up as it is, a revisit to this particular dystopian…

The first of three Blade Runner 2049 shorts dropped so as to bridge the gap between the events of the 1982 film (which left off in 2019) and the Warner Bros./Sony/Alcon sequel that’s opening on Oct. 6. Directed by Ridley Scott’s son, Luke Scott, 2036: Nexus Dawn follows Jared Leto’s Niander Wallace who has created a…

A construction worker was killed today in Hungary while tearing down sets for the still-untitled Blade Runner sequel. The film crew had wrapped production at a sound stage in Budapest and already moved to a new location when the accident occurred. A spokesman for Alcon Entertainment, which is producing the film, said…

EXCLUSIVE: Alcon Entertainment has acquired rights to Besties, a comedic thriller pitch from Sheri Elwood, who is currently co-executive producer of Fox’s Lucifer. Madhouse Entertainment, which reps Elwood, will produce the feature film project. The plot centers on a young woman, left high and dry by her former…