Last time we counted, Tim Burton had approximately 86 projects in development. But one of them has just got significantly nearer to fruition, with the news from Deadline that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies author Seth Grahame-Smith is at work on the script for **Dark Shadows.
The film, which has been bubbling under for a while now, originally had a screenplay by John August (Big Fish, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Corpse Bride), but Grahame-Smith's version seems to be an entirely fresh start, rather than just a revision.
He's best known now for his mega-selling one-joke literary pastiches, but Grahame-Smith does have some previous scriptwriting form; most recently for MTV's The Hard Times of RJ Berger, which he co-created. The movies are increasingly beckoning though, with David O Russell and Natalie Portman circling Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and Grahame-Smith writing his own adaptation of his book Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. Tim Burton is producing Abe Lincoln with Timur Bekmambetov. And therein lies the connection.
Dark Shadows itself was a show that ran on the ABC network for more than 1200 episodes between 1966 and 1971, featuring ghosts, vampires, zombies, werewolves, parallel universes, time-shifting, melodrama, and general extreme creakiness. Johnny Depp is a lifelong fan, and has been champing at the bit to play the bloodsucking central role of Barnabus Collins. If all goes to plan, he'll finally get his chance when shooting starts in January.