Pennywise the clown is looking for a new ringmaster following the news director Cary Fukunaga has departed the big screen adaptation of Stephen King’s It.
The complex story involves a group of friends being terrorized by the sewer-dwelling harlequin, both as children and finally as adults when they reunite to battle the menace that tainted their lives.
Producers New Line were reportedly blocking Fukunaga’s wish to make two films based on the chunky tome. A lengthy TV version famously floated in during the early Nineties, starring Tim Curry as the floppy-shoed nemesis.
Rising star Will Poulter was being courted to play the new Pennywise. KatzSmith (Seth Grahame-Smith and David Katzenberg) are producing with Dan Lin and Roy Lee. They’ll be dealing with the fallout from the loss of Fukunaga, whose eerie visuals for HBO’s True Detective made him a strong choice to bring King’s world to life.
With the production a helmer down, perhaps Mike Flanagan could take the vacant chair? He directed Oculus, that the author greatly admired, and is currently working on a transfer of Gerald’s Game.
