Octavia Spencer has launched Orit Entertainment, a new production company with partner Brian Clisham, which has entered an exclusive three-year pod deal with 20th Century Fox TV. Under the pact, Spencer and Clisham will develop television shows, comedy and drama, across all platforms. This marks the sixth TCFTV…

EXCLUSIVE: As we watch superhero movies dominate Deadline’s Most Profitable Pic tournament, it was just a matter of time before Netflix got in that game. Sure enough, sources say they are wrapping up deals with Octavia Spencer and Melissa McCarthy to star this fall in Thunder Force, a film that Ben Falcone has written…

EXCLUSIVE: Gabrielle Union will star in and produce through her I’ll Have Another production banner an adaptation of the April Sinclair novel Coffee Will Make You Black. Octavia Spencer will produce the film through her Orit banner with Union and Wyolah Films’ Tate Taylor and John Norris. The film was scripted and…

Some Ohio teenagers ask a random woman to buy them booze. Harmless kid stuff, right? Not when the askee is Sue Ann, a loner who sees an opportunity to make some new friends. Here’s the first trailer for Ma, a Blumhouse starring Oscar winner Octavia Spencer as the woman who agrees to purchase alcohol for the group and…

Ma, the thriller from Tate Taylor and Jason Blum that stars Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, has landed a release date. Universal said the pic is taking on a slot held for a Blumhouse project and will bow wide in theaters May 31. Spencer stars as Sue Ann, a loner in a quiet Ohio town who one day is asked by Maggie (Diana…

Oscar winners Sam Rockwell, Octavia Spencer and Allison Janney have been set to star in The Heart, which will be the next film from writer-directors Nat Faxon and Jim Rash. The duo, who won the Adapted Screenplay Oscar with Alexander Payne for The Descendants, will also helm this one next and start shooting at year’s…

EXCLUSIVE: The Help stars Bryce Dallas Howard and Oscar winner Octavia Spencer will be working together again in Universal’s upcoming female ensemble comedy Fairy Tale Ending.  Universal recently acquired the pitch from Jim Hecht (A Wizard's Tale, Ice Age: The Meltdown) and Tracy McMillan (Marvel’s Runaways and Mad Men…

Even before the people chose Green Book at the Toronto Film Festival and anointed Peter Farrelly's film a surprise Oscar contender, the film survived a road trip as overflowing with twists and turns as the story onscreen. Green Book recreates the concert tour of piano virtuoso Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), a black…

Netflix has given the green light to Madam C.J. Walker, an eight-episode limited series starring and executive produced by Oscar winner Octavia Spencer and executive produced by LeBron James. The announcement was made by VP original programming Cindy Holland during Netflix’s TCA executive session. Janine Sherman…

EXCLUSIVE: It’s a great story that delves into the caste system, racism and sexism. The Rhinelander Affair, written by William Kinsolving, follows the controversial 1925 divorce trial in New York involving a man from an upper-class New Rochelle family who married a bi-racial, working-class woman. It is a ripped from…

Apple has given a 10-episode series order to Are You Sleeping, a thriller drama starring Oscar winner Octavia Spencer (The Help, Hidden Figures) that hails from Reese Witherspoon's Hello Sunshine and the scripted drama venture of Peter Chernin's Chernin Entertainment and Endeavor Content. Rex/Shutterstock Are You S…

EXCLUSIVE: BLOOM will launch international sales at Cannes for the Julius Onah-directed Luce. The just-wrapped film stars Naomi Watts, Octavia Spencer, Tim Roth and Mudbound‘s Kelvin Harrison Jr. The film is based on J.C. Lee's play, which was adapted by Lee and Onah. John Baker, Onah and Andrew Yang are producing…