There has been a live-action “Magic School Bus” movie in the works, and they’ve now landed on actress Elizabeth Banks to play the iconic Ms. Valerie Frizzle, the school teacher who takes her students on a fantastic voyage to help educate them outside of the classroom with epic field trips (via the titular bus) that even include shrinking down into the human body. Banks takes over the role, which had been voiced by beloved comedic actress Lily Tomlin (“Grace & Frankie”) on the mega-popular PBS animated series that debuted back in 1994 (based on the Scholastic book series from Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen).
As mentioned by The Hollywood Reporter, the film is coming from Legendary (behind the MonsterVerse and “Dune” franchises) and director Rob Letterman, who reunites with the studio and pens the script after helming the successful live-action/animation hybrid Nintendo film “Pokémon Detective Pikachu,” which had Canadian actor Ryan Reynolds as the voice of the adorable titular character alongside Justice Smith, Kathryn Newton, and more.
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Of course, Letterman is no stranger to the world of children’s book adaptations, as he helmed the Jack Black-led “Goosebumps” movie and the recent streaming series that had “Friends” star David Schwimmer and Justin Long involved. Back in April, it was announced that he was also recruited by Disney+ to help reboot the Harvey Comics character “Casper the Friendly Ghost” for a live-action show alongside Hilary Winston, Steven Spielberg, and UPC.
Banks has had quite a varied career with a steady stream of credits, such as Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” trilogy, “Pitch Perfect,” “The Lego Movie,” James Gunn‘s “Slither,” the original run of “The Hunger Games” films, and has even been a director, having attempted to reboot the “Charlie’s Angels” film franchise and was behind the creature feature “Cocaine Bear.” Most recently, she was seen in the VFX-heavy Peacock sci-fi comedy show, “The Miniature Wife.”
We’re still waiting on a release date for “The Magic School Bus” as the movie shifted from Universal Pictures to Legendary. It remains to be seen which major distributor will release it, but there is a very strong working relationship with Warner Bros., being their longtime partner (although none was named in the report). The producing team will feature Scholastic, Banks’ Brownstone Productions, Marc Platt Productions, and Legendary.
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