Latest in Universal Pictures

EXCLUSIVE: Mamoudou Athie, who currently co-stars on the Facebook series, Sorry for Your Loss, has landed a lead role in Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment's Jurassic World 3. He’s set to star opposite returning cast members Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Laura Dern, Sam Neill, and Jeff Goldblum. Colin…

EXCLUSIVE: Felicia Pride is bringing the heat to Universal Pictures. The studio is teaming with Will Packer Productions to develop Deeper, an erotic romance based on an original idea from the Queen Sugar writer. Pride is set to write the script, but specific details about the story are being kept under wraps. Will…

COMMENTARY: To judge from its trailer, Sam Mendes' upcoming 1917, like most modern war dramas — Hacksaw Ridge, Saving Private Ryan, War Horse, even Dunkirk — is essentially a personal story. In the fourth year of World War I, two British soldiers, played by George MacKay and Dean-Charles Chapman, thread their way…

David Burke, who has been Universal Pictures’ GM for the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland since 2006, has been named chief marketing officer at Lakia. It’s a new position for the animation studio behind the Oscar-nominated pics Coraline, ParaNorman, The Boxtrolls and Kubo and the Two Strings. The Oregon-based…

Anthony Michael Hall has join the cast of Halloween Kills, the first of two announced sequels in David Gordon Green and Danny McBride's reincarnation of the Universal franchise. Deadline has confirmed that the veteran actor will star alongside Halloween queen Jamie Lee Curtis. The continuation of the rebooted…

EXCLUSIVE: Universal Pictures has appointed former Fox executive Patricia Kamitsuji Managing Director of the studio's operating company in the key Brazil market. The position will report to Mauricio Duran, Universal Pictures International's SVP of Latin America. Kamitsuji has had a career spanning more than two…

Universal is putting the brakes on the marketing for their Blumhouse release The Hunt in the wake of recent mass shootings which have taken the lives of 34 people in El Paso, Texas; Dayton, Ohio; and Gilroy, California. "Out of sensitivity to the attention on the country's recent shooting tragedies, Universal Pictures…

Director Tina Gordon is warming up her vocal cords to helm Universal Pictures’ musical comedy Praise This, a music-competition feature set in the world of youth choirs. The film is slated for release on September 25, 2020. Gordon will rewrite the script for Praise This, which is based on an original idea by Tim…

EXCLUSIVE: Three decades later, the block is still standing. Universal Pictures is marking the 30th anniversary of Spike Lee’s incendiary and still-topical Do the Right Thing with a remastered 4K restoration that will hit theaters June 28. In partnership with Universal Pictures Home Entertainment and the Criterion…

Universal Pictures has emerged as the victors for rights to Amari and the Night Brothers, an unpublished book by B.B. Alston, which is a starring vehicle for Black-ish star Marsai Martin, who is also a producer. Martin is coming off of the release of her Universal comedy, Little, which she served as the executive…

Lore in my wife’s family says that her mother, a beautiful Jewish immigrant fleeing grief in the Ukraine about a century ago, ran into someone named Carl Laemmle on a ship crossing the Atlantic. As the story goes, Laemmle asked her to check in with his still-young Universal film company, as she might have a future in…

DreamWorks, Universal Pictures and VStar Entertainment Group will bring the animated franchise Trolls to life with a 60-city-plus tour of large theaters and venues later this year, the companies announced today. Trolls Live! will mark the first original touring production featuring such characters as Poppy, Branch and…