‘Rebecca’ Starring Lily James and Armie Hammer Goes to Netflix
Netflix and Working Title confirm that British director Ben Wheatley (“Kill List,” “High Rise”) has signed on to direct “Kingsman” screenwriter Jane Goldman’s adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s 1938 gothic romantic thriller.
Lily James (Working Title’s “Baby Driver” and “Darkest Hour”) stars as a young married woman (played by Joan Fontaine in Hitchcock’s 1940 classic) who arrives at Manderley, the bleak English coast estate of her new husband Maxim DeWinter (“On the Basis of Sex” star Armie Hammer takes on the Laurence Olivier role). There she battles the shadow of his dead first wife Rebecca, as well as her imposing housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers.
More details to come. James most recently starred in the worldwide blockbuster “Momma Mia! Here We Go Again,” while Hammer is coming off the acclaimed “Call Me By Your Name.”
This is not Working Title’s first foray with the streaming giant. They are currently shooting Netflix’s “Tales of the City” series with Laura Linney, Olympia Dukakis, Ellen Page and many of the original cast members from the original series.
Working Title Films, co-chaired by Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner, has made over 100 films that have grossed over $7.5 billion worldwide to date. Their films have won 14 Academy Awards, 40 BAFTA Awards, the Producers Guild of America’s David O. Selznick Achievement Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures. Working Title’s recent releases include Joe Wright’s “Darkest Hour,” starring Oscar-winner Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill; “Victoria & Abdul,” directed by Stephen Frears and starring Judi Dench as Queen Victoria; “Johnny English Strikes Again,” starring Rowan Atkinson and directed by David Kerr; and James Marsh’s “King of Thieves,” starring Michael Caine, Jim Broadbent, Tom Courtenay, and Ray Winstone.
This year’s Oscar season brings Josie Rourke’s “Mary, Queen of Scots,” starring Saoirse Ronan and Margot Robbie; in the pipeline are Joe Cornish’s “The Kid Who Would Be King,” starring Patrick Stewart and Rebecca Ferguson; Marjane Satrapi’s Marie Curie biopic “Radioactive,” starring Rosamund Pike and Sam Riley; Tom Hooper’s film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical “Cats,” starring Ian McKellen, Jennifer Hudson, James Corden, and Taylor Swift; and an untitled Danny Boyle and Richard Curtis project, starring Lily James, Himesh Patel and Kate McKinnon.
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