BEETLEJUICE 2 in development as part of KatzSmith first-look deal at Warner Bros.

A sequel to Tim Burton's Beetlejuice is in development. Deadline reports that the project is part of a first-look deal between KatzSmith Productions partners David Katzenberg and Seth Grahame-Smith and Warner Bros. The rights are still being worked out, but it is expected to be one of the first projects. The film is planned as a sequel and will not be a remake; the intention is to reboot it by advancing the storyline of the original.

The deal with the studio stemmed from screenwriting work that Grahame-Smith did for Burton on Dark Shadows, currently in production with Johnny Depp heading the cast. KatzSmith is a smart investment for the studio, they get two partners who are full of some great creativity and who are established writers and aspiring feature directors.

Here is what WB production president Greg Silverman had to say:

“We first got to know Seth through his fantastic work on Dark Shadows, and it immediately became a priority to expand our relationship with him. Seth introduced us to David, who greatly impresses us with the vision for KatzSmith from the very first meeting. We firmly believe in their talents and are extremely excited to welcome them to the Warners family.” 


Grahame-Smith is going to write two scripts as part of the deal, so Beetlejuice 2 could be one of them. Katzsmith's model is like Bad Robot and Imagine Entertainment, where the principals generate many of the ideas that are turned into films. Katzenberg and Grahame-Smith met working on webseries for Michael Cera and Clarke Duke. 

Here is what Grahame-Smith had to say about the project

“We want to make big movies based on big ideas and inspired by the comedies we grew up loving. The thing we like about Bad Robot and Imagine is that they are never pigeonholed because they do good work across a broad spectrum. We want to slowly grow into a company that follows in those footsteps.” Said Katzenberg, who’s 28: “We’re young, we’ve got a lot to learn, and we are going to have producers who help us on the first couple of big films. Warner Bros is a studio that gets behind its movies and is filmmaker friendly.” The deal will allow them to buy material, but when possible they intend to self-generate, Katzenberg said. “We pride ourselves on coming up with a lot of our own ideas, about 90% of the projects we’ve generated in film and TV are ones we created and developed. The studio will help us bring our ideas to the finish line.”


There are a number of projects currently in production, including: We Three Kings, Grahame-Smith’s next novel, which is "a large scale telling of what the Three Wiseman from the Bible were actually doing in the manger that night." Grand Central is set to publish the book on April 2012. Grahame-Smith is writing the script on spec with KatzSmith producing; Bryantology, in which "a loser on the verge of losing his house exploits a tax loophole, invents a religion and names his home a tax exempt place of worship.  When the religion goes viral, followers show up on his doorstep and the hapless guy is suddenly a cult leader"; Night of the Living, a stop-motion animated film that Grahame-Smith might script, with Tim Burton producing along with KatzSmith. "A town of peaceful monsters must learn how to fight when it is invaded by humans"; KatzSmith is producing an adaptation of Stuart Kaminsky’s novel series about 40s Hollywood private eye Toby Peters; and Fire Teddy, a comedy script by Matthew Kaplan & Jason Leinwand that Katzenberg will direct. "An underachieving nice guy is hired as a low level employee at a corporate office. Ordered by his Machiavellian boss to fire Teddy, the newcomer can’t do it and becomes fast friends with Teddy through his futile attempts."

These sounds like some pretty cool projects, including the Beetlejuice sequel. I think that if anyone can do the film justice it is Katzmith Productions. What are your thoughts?

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