WB button button snaps up comicbook 'Lucid'

Warner Bros. has acquired the rights to Archaia Entertainment's comicbook small-series "Lucid" for author-producer Akiva Goldsman to develop and provide just like a potential new film franchise. Zachary Quinto's production banner Just before the doorway, which created it, can also be aboard to evolve the house for your bigscreen. With "Harry Potter" getting ended its run within the studio, WB is about the quest for completely new projects to think about its place. If this was introduced at Hillcrest Comic-Disadvantage, last season, "Lucid" was known to love an account from the products transpires with Harry Potter if he was elevated and grew to become part of the CIA. Composed by "True Blood stream" thesp Michael McMillian and outlined by Anna Wieszczyk, some-book series happens in the parallel world where miracle is real and world leaders have secret agents attempting to safeguard against supernatural risks. Primary character can be a youthful agent, recently hired "Protector in the Realm," who must use his capabilities just like a covert spy and combat mage to avoid an occult technology dealer. No film author has yet been hired to evolve the fantasy actioner. Archaia's editor-in-chief Stephen Christy would also be the producer round the pic. "Lucid" was the initial comicbook to depart Quinto's Just before the doorway banner with Archaia before next tabs on "Mr. Murder is Dead," put together by Victor Quinaz, with art by Brent Schoonover. The "Lucid" deal might be the 2nd for Archaia with Warner Bros. and Goldsman after recently creating reclusive dinosaur-tale "Bolivar," using the approaching book from Sean Rubin, becoming an animated feature that Kerry Foster's Weed Road may also be aboard to produce and Kealan O'Rourke will write and direct. Contact Marc Graser at marc.graser@variety.com

DWA shares drop twelve percent

Shares of DreamWorks Animation walked 12.16% to $17.26 Wednesday, one of the finest nonwinners round the Nasdaq as well as the stock's finest one-day visit a long time, after dour quarterly earnings and negative comments on Wall Street. The studio introduced Tuesday after market close that profits walked greater than 70% to $24 million from $85 million on lower home video sales, plus a disappointing performance of "Kung Fu Panda 2" released in December. Goldman Sachs decreased its earnings estimations round the Glendale, Calif. company and experts were concerned at rising costs together with as well as much softer home cinema sales, which Boss Jeffrey Katzenberg mentioned reflect "challenges for your industry as whole." But DreamWorks only releases two or three films yearly and isn't part of a bigger company, which causes it to be particularly prone to fluctuations in key revenue streams. The shares were inside the doghouse for a number of 2011 combined with started a rocky climb this year. Captured it introduced a greater-profile partnership to create animated photos in China. Contact the number newsroom at news@variety.com

AnnaSophia Robb cast as young Carrie Bradshaw

RobbThe CW has its Carrie Bradshaw. AnnaSophia Robb has been cast as the lead in the pilot "The Carrie Diaries," the prequel to the wildly successful HBO comedy "Sex and the City." Project, from Warner Bros. Television, is based upon the novel "The Carrie Diaries" by Candace Bushnell. Amy B. Harris, Josh Schwartz, Stephanie Savage, Len Goldstein, Candace Bushnell will exec produce. Pilot was written by Amy B. Harris and will directed by Miguel Arteta, who will serve as an exec producer on the pilot as well. Logline centers on a young Bradshaw, who comes of age in the 1980s and is asking her first questions about love, sex, friendship and family while exploring the worlds of high school and Manhattan. Stefania Owen has previously been cast as Dorrit, Carrie's younger rebellious sister. Robb, whose first acting credits date back to 2004, has mostly worked in film. Some of her most well-known titles are "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," "Bridge to Terabithia" and "Race to Witch Mountain." Robb is repped by CAA and Untitled Entertainment. Contact Stuart Levine at stuart.levine@variety.com

'Captive,' 'War Witch' start sales

MADRID -- Provided by Films Distribution, Brillante Mendoza's "Captive" and Kim Nguyen's "War Witch" folded off Berlin Competition berths to tie lower spirited initial sales. Underscoring the impact of Academy Award nominations, Films Distribution also saw sterling extra sales on Oscar competitors "Monsieur Lazhar" and "The Kitty in Paris." A truth-based Filipino hostage crisis starring Isabelle Huppert in the buzzed-about perf while you abductee, "Captive" closed Italia with Nomad Film in the "excellent, six-figure deal," mentioned Films Distribution partner Nicolas Brigaud-Robert. Among Eastern European and Latin American deals, "Captive" clinched Belgium (AP Manana) and South usa (Providence Filmes), along with a vacation in a holiday in greece and Europe (Trigon-Film). Scandinavia continues to be signed, mentioned Brigaud-Robert. "Captive" is created by Didier Costet's Quick Prods., Mendoza's longtime producer, inside a substantially greater budget than Mendoza's norm. "We handled to acquire Mendoza to more mainstream entrepreneurs: Intentions met reality," mentioned Brigaud-Robert. Winning Rachel Mwanza an actress Silver Bear on her behalf perf just like a girl-soldier in the harrowing African civil war, "War Witch" closed Berlin's Competition. It offered France (Happiness Distribution), Imagine (Benelux), Europe (Agora Films) and Belgium (Against Gravity). A U.S. deal is pending, mentioned Brigaud-Robert. "With 'War Witch' screening so late at Berlin, any sales whatsoever in Berlin is definitely an very good sign," he added. Following multiple earlier major-territory deals, "Lazhar" offered a hefty 14 more areas in Berlin, including U.K. (Soda Pictures), Mexico (Canana), Norwegian (Europa Film), Denmark (Ost For Paradise) and Korea (Aud). Introduced at 2011's Berlin, "Cat" has step-by-step totalled up 30-plus territory deals. Berlin dealings incorporated an Cinemax South Usa pact, Brigaud Robert mentioned. Films Distribution's Berlin purchasing and selling was "brisk and definitely above-average," he added, echoing various other effective sales reps wealthy in-profile British-language photos. Adopt Films needed U.S. rights to Jean-Marc Vallee's "Cafe p Flore" this year's week, inside an already-introduced deal. Contact the number newsroom at news@variety.com

BenderSpink Heads To The New West

Sci-fi western comic searching for adaptationBenderSpink, the expansion-management company run by Chris Bender and JC Spink (see whatever they did there?) just clicked on within the rights to Jimmy Palmiotti and Phil Noto's brief indie comic series The Completely New West.The story involves disgraced police detective Daniel Wise, in the blasted near-future LA. An electromagnetic pulse blast makes all technology useless, littering the streets with abandoned automobiles and producing a significant crimewave the cops is only able to counter on horseback. When the mayor is kidnapped, our anti-hero, with a unfortunate previous history along with his municipal superior, must increase and conduct his save mission getting a sword...The project is mounted on BenderSpink's recent push to develop original comics that have movie potential, in cahoots with Sean Patrick O'Reilly's Arcana Comics. The Completely New West is slightly off aside of the deal though, since its a present property, launched with the now-defunct Black Bull Entertainment in 2005.BenderSpink may be the organization behind the Ring remakes as well as the Butterfly Effect movies, but comics aren't a completely new factor on their own account. They produced David Cronenberg's Past Violence from John Wagner and Vincent Locke's graphic novel, and they're developing John K. Vaughan's Y: The Ultimate Guy andEx Machina, among other comic-y projects.There's not sure yet on screenwriters or company company directors for your New West, but Palmiotti themselves isn't a stranger to scripting, getting written Painkiller Jane for SyFy, together with a draft in the as-yet unproduced Dead Space movie. Could he be up for adapting their very own work, and could he ensure it is not appear as being a mix between Avoid NY and Zatoichi? Watch this space.

Elijah Wood talks The Hobbit

Using the discharge of The Hobbit just below 11 several weeks away, Elijah Wood continues to be talking about precisely how nostalgic it had been to step in time for you to film more moments within the familiar places of Middle-earth."It had been a present to return and return," Wood told Collider. "I had been in Hobbiton again, the very first time in 11 years. I switched 19 in Hobbiton. I am 30 now. That put several things into perspective. It had been beautiful. It had been just beautiful to return.Inch "I had been there for any month, and quite a few of time only agreed to be likely to set every single day and meeting many of the new cast people, making up ground with old buddies, and finding yourself in Wellington again. It feels as though home, and individuals people seem like relatives in my experience. It had been this type of treat to return. It had been awesome!"Wood continues to go over how everything has transformed when it comes to we've got the technology open to Jackson and the crew, explaining the way the new three dimensional cameras permit them to tweak things around the hoof."This is an odd feeling of just tuning into [the three dimensional] and accepting it, but it is totally amazing," states Wood. "And, it is awesome to determine the three dimensional on set, and to be aware what the pictures ultimately seem like. We've got the technology is really good now. I recall, a long time and years back, video assist really was rudimentary and watching playback am rudimentary.""Now, since the Hobbit has been shot electronically, we are visiting a full HD image, in three dimensional, virtually just as it is going to look when it is tossed up onto a giant screen. That's amazing! And, it requires many of the uncertainty from it. They are able to perform a large amount of the fine-tuning at the time, that is really awesome."The Hobbit: An Unpredicted Journey opens within the United kingdom on 14 December 2012. Start counting lower the times...

The Vampire Diaries Casts Smallville's Cassidy Freeman

Cassidy Freeman Cassidy Freeman is returning to The CW. The Smallville alum has booked a guest-spot on The Vampire Diaries, TVGuide.com has confirmed. Freeman, who portrayed sometimes villain Tess Mercer on the recently ended super series, will play Vampire Diaries' Sage, a character seen in 1920s flashbacks. Her allure is felt by both the Salvatore brothers and the Original family. Vampire Diaries Postmortem: How will Klaus retaliate? A Klaus-Caroline pairing? Freeman next appears in A&E's new series Longmire. She'll make her Vampire Diaries debut in Episode 16, and she has the potential to recur. TVLine.com first reported the news. The Vampire Diaries airs Thursdays at 8/7c on The CW.

Pair nab privileges to V.C. Andrews library

'Family Storms'Dan Angel ("Door-to-doorInch) from the Hatchery has bought privileges towards the V.C. Andrews library and teamed with Jane Startz ("Ella Enchanted") to build up and convey movies, TV series and telepics according to Andrews' works.Angel and Startz introduced the partnership Friday. You will find presently 70 Andrews books, released in 1979 with "Flowers within the Loft," with worldwide sales well over 106 million copies in 95 nations in 26 languages in tales mixing aspects of Medieval horror and family secrets. Andrew Neiderman, who's composed 44 books under their own title, continues to be the freelancer of Andrews' books since her dying in 1986.The most recent addition is "Family Storms" and it is follow up "Cloudburst," launched within the fall. Paranormal love story "In To The Darkness" is going to be released in March and "The Forbidden Sister is going to be released within the fall 2012, then its follow up "Roxy's Story.""V.C. Andrews is really a significant cultural icon and it has been during the last 30 years,Inch Startz stated. "Her collected works really are a treasure chest of genres -- romance, medieval, paranormal -- with highly original and frequently outr tales which have enormous multigenerational and multicultural appeal." Angel's credits include "The Haunting Hour," "Serta Versus." and "Gifted Hands." Startz created "The Indian within the Cupboard," "The Mighty" and "Tuck Everlasting."Simon & Schuster United kingdom, lengthy-term marketers of V.C. Andrews, stated inside a statement, "We're delighted that Virginia Andrews will discover a new audience through this exciting collaboration using the Hatchery and Jane Startz Prods., using this global brand to increased levels."In 2007, the Hatchery and Jaffe/Braunstein introduced intends to create a miniseries for Lifetime in line with the Andrews' "The Landry" however the project did not get together. Contact Dork McNary at dork.mcnary@variety.com