It’s three decades ago that Steven Soderbergh’s debut sex lies & videotape won the top Sundance Film Festival prize and turned the indie film into an industry after his $1 million film grossed $36 million for Miramax. He's since generated Oscar winners (Traffic, Erin Brockovich) and launched blockbuster franchises (Oce…

Amazon Studios has acquired The Report, the drama written and directed by Scott Z. Burns that stars Adam Driver, Annette Benning, Jon Hamm, Ted Levin, Maura Tierney and Michael C. Hall. It tells the true story of Daniel Jones’ exhaustive six-year investigation into the CIA’s use of torture on detainees suspected of…

EXCLUSIVE: The Affair star Maura Tierney is set to co-star in Vice Studios’ The Torture Report, written and directed by The Bourne Ultimatum scribe Scott Z. Burns. Tierney will join Adam Driver, Annette Bening, Jon Hamm, Tim Blake Nelson, Ben McKenzie, Matthew Rhys, Jennifer Morrison, and Michael C. Hall. Set…

Tim Blake Nelson (O Brother, Where Art Thou?), Ben McKenzie (Gotham), Matthew Rhys (The Americans), Ted Levine (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) and Michael C. Hall (Dexter) have boarded The Torture Report, the CIA drama written and directed by Scott Z. Burns from Vice Studios. They join previously announced cast Adam…

EXCLUSIVE: Annette Bening, Adam Driver, Jon Hamm and Jennifer Morrison are all in talks to star in a CIA drama tentatively titled The Torture Report, which will be written and directed by The Bourne Ultimatum and Contagion scribe Scott Z. Burns. VICE Studios is handling the financing for this project, which focuses on…

EXCLUSIVE: Jeff Robinov’s Studio 8 just acquired the action thriller pitch Planet Kill which will be produced by Steven Soderbergh and may actually direct. Scott Z. Burns (Contagion) and James Greer (Unsane) came up with the original story which is being kept under wraps. Soderbergh and Greer’s psychological thriller U…

EXCLUSIVE: Some of the best screenwriters have come from journalism. Amazon Studios has acquired the screenplay pitch The Bunker from former New York Times columnist and current Vanity Fair correspondent Nick Bilton. Scott Z. Burns has become attached to direct and produce the project, which marks Bilton’s first…

EXCLUSIVE: Steven Soderbergh will produce with an eye to direct a feature film about the Panama Papers, the biggest leak of data in corporate and government history. Scott Z. Burns is expected to write the script, based on an upcoming book Secrecy World that Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jake Bernstein is writing…

Conspiracy, a drama series project based on Christopher MacBride’s 2012 found footage-style indie feature The Conspiracy, has landed at NBC as a put pilot. Written and executive produced by Contagion scribe Scott Z. Burns, the TV adaptation centers on a conspiracy theorist who vanishes after a man is killed at an…

EXCLUSIVE: Summit Entertainment is in final negotiations to make a green light commitment on The Bitter Pill, the Scott Z. Burns script that Steven Soderbergh will direct as his next film. Production will start in April on a thriller which has a budget in the $30 million range. Deadline revealed that Summit was the…

Summit Entertainment and David Linde’s Lava Bear are the top two contenders for Bitter Pill, the Scott Z. Burns script that is being shopped as Steven Soderbergh’s likely next film. I’d say Summit is the frontrunner for a script that wasn’t distributed widely. Paramount was the other initial place (producer Lorenzo di…

EXCLUSIVE: In the wake of Osama Bin Laden’s killing by a Navy SEAL team, Hollywood is suddenly obsessed with politically-charged fact-based mission movies. Momentum is building on one of those at Warner Bros, The Mission. David O Russell is circling the picture and the studio is courting Brad Pitt to star. This could…