With David O. Russell and Mike White both having temporarily filled and subsequently vacated the director’s chair for the gestating adaptation of “Pride And Prejudice And Zombies” the hunt is still on and more names continue to surface. Last month, Craig Gillespie — who helmed “Lars And the Real Girl” and the upcoming “Fright Night” — was in talks for the gig and now a directing/producing duo are throwing their hats in the ring.
THR reports that Seth Grahame-Smith and David Katzenberg are now being eyed by Lionsgate to direct the film. As you probably already know Grahame-Smith actually penned the book this is all based on — the repurposed Jane Austen tale stacked with zombies — and what you may not have known is that he and Katzenberg have been producing and directing (respectively) the MTV comedy “The Hard Times of RJ Berger” (yeah, we’ve never seen it either). We took a quick look at the trailer (which you can see below) for the show and it’s basically a teenage version of “Hung” about a kid with a big dick who gets into hilarious encounters. Talk about fantasy. But seriously, we’re not sure why these guys weren’t in the ring in the first place aside from the fact that entrusting a big film to first-time feature directors is a bit of a gamble.
But it would appear these guys are just a couple of many that the studio is chatting with. We’re not sure what the difficulty is in securing a director — though David O. Russell hinted the cheapie budget might be an issue — but Lionsgate is clearly taking their time in finding the person who will make the right fit.