EXCLUSIVE: 10 Cloverfield Lane helmer Daniel Trachtenberg is in talks to direct Lionsgate’s film about master illusionist Harry Houdini. This is the film that seemed to pull a vanishing act after reports that Johnny Depp was going to star and Dean Parisot direct. That went by the wayside in a puff of smoke, but I’ve…

Harry Houdini has fascinated Hollywood for years and various film projects based on his life are in development around town at Sony and Summit. Now STX Entertainment has entered the mix by acquiring the motion picture rights to David Jaher's The Witch Of Lime Street: Seance, Seduction And Houdini In The Spirit World…

Turner Classic Movies is bringing its restoration of “lost” Harry Houdini classic The Grim Game to have its world-premiere screening at its TCM Classic Film Festival in March. This much-sought-after 1919 film — a complete print of which only recently was brought to TCM for restoration — features the escape artist and…

Johnny Depp doing Harry Houdini in Lionsgate’s Summit biopic based on William Kalush and Larry Sloman’s book The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America’s First Superhero? It’s being blasted elsewhere as a big scoop, but some followup reporting convinces us that it’s not much further along when Deadline reported…

EXCLUSIVE: The life story of illusionist Harry Houdini has long fascinated Hollywood, but nobody has been able to do anything about it. Sony Pictures has Max Landis working his magic on a new draft of Houdini, the film being produced by Jimmy Miller. I’m told that is telling the story with an HP Lovecraft influence…

EXCLUSIVE: Just the other day, Mike Fleming reported on DreamWorks acquiring Voices from the Dead, an original script by Changeling and Thor scribe J. Michael Straczynski. Based on the real-life friendship between magician Harry Houdini and mystery author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, it is a fictional account of how they…

DreamWorks has acquired Voices from the Dead, an original script by Changeling and Thor scribe J. Michael Straczynski. The thriller is based on the friendship between magician Harry Houdini and mystery author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. They were actually friends, but the script is a fictional account of how they teamed…