*Gina Prince-Bythewood has been tapped to direct MGM’s sci-fi thriller “Exoplanet” after the studio secured the rights to adapt Minnie Schedeen’s short story into a feature.
Per Deadline, Matt Tolmach (Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Venom, Morbius) and David Manpearl are attached to produce for Matt Tolmach Productions. Schedeen will adapt her short story for the screen. According to the report, the logline is being kept under wraps.
“I am so thrilled to be reuniting again with Gina Prince-Bythewood. The opportunity to work with her on Love and Basketball was an incredible experience and to have a chance to work with her again is hugely exciting,” said Michael De Luca, MGM’s Film Group chairman.
“We are so happy to welcome Gina to the MGM family, along with Minnie, Matt and David,” said Pamela Abdy, MGM’s Film Group president.
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Meanwhile, an earlier report noted that Gina has teamed with Tina Mabry to adapt the NY Times best-selling novel “The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat” for Searchlight Pictures. Mabry will direct from an original script by Prince-Bythewood.
Edward Kelsey Moore’s debut “Supremes” novel follows best friends Odette, Barbara Jean and Clarice, who consider Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat diner a “home away from home” in their Indiana town. According to a synopsis, the trio (known as “The Supremes”) has “weathered life’s storms together for decades through marriage and children, happiness and the blues. Now, they will have to rely on their strong bond to survive their most challenging year yet as race, heartbreak and illness stir up the past and threaten to destroy their friendship.”
According to Variety, Mabry and Prince-Bythewood first teased plans for a collaboration while reflecting on their mentor-mentee relationship during an alumni spotlight interview for Slamdance.
“It is an adaptation that I wrote. But I knew I wasn’t going to be able to direct and the question came up, ‘Who should direct it? And who do you trust?’” Prince-Bythewood said during the conversation. “I have an extremely tiny list, but you [Tina] were right at the top. But, you know, it’s one thing for me to say, ‘I think this woman can do it,’ but you had to go in and knock out that meeting, which you did. I mean, I heard you made them cry.”
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