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Taika Waititi may direct James, marking his second Everett novel adaptation, showcasing his versatility in storytelling and visual style. James reimagines Mark Twain's classic tale from an enslaved perspective, exploring race, identity, and social boundaries in the American South. Waititi's potential collaboration with Steven Spielberg as co-producer promises to elevate and expand the impact of Everett's subversive narrative.

Acclaimed filmmaker Taika Waititi is currently in discussions to direct a new movie titled James, based on the novel of the same name by renowned author Percival Everett. If finalized, this would mark the second film adaptation of an Everett novel within two years, following American Fiction, which was based on his 2001 novel Erasure.

Under Cord Jeffersons outstanding direction and Jeffrey Wrights exquisite performance, the movie won Best Adapted Screenplay at the 96th Academy Awards, along with nominations in the categories of Best Picture and Best Actor for Wright.

American Fiction R for language throughout,...

Universal has acquired the film rights to Percival Everett latest novel “James,” with Taika Waititi in early talks to direct.

Published this past March by Doubleday, “James” reimagines Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” from the perspective of Huck Finn’s runaway slave companion Jim.

In Everett’s reimagining, Jim, who goes by the name of James, is a wise and literate man who teaches other slaves to read, and who like other educated Black men and women keeps his knowledge a secret to avoid punishment from white slaveowners.

Steven Spielberg will serve as an executive producer on the film through Amblin Partners alongside Everett, who will adapt the screenplay.

Everett’s new project comes seven months after the release of “American Fiction,” an adaptation of his acclaimed 2001 novel “Erasure” about a struggling Black writer named Thelonious “Monk” Ellison who, in his bitterness, writes a novel intended as...

Here's a ride down the Misssissippi River you won't have been expecting. Universal just dropped a literary bombshell by securing the rights to James, a modern twist on Mark Twains classic The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn which was authored by Percival Everett. And there's some serious A-list talent involved behind the scenes with none other than Steven Spielberg and Taika Waititi taking charge of the project. Spielberg will executive produce through Amblin Partners, with Waititi in early talks to direct, according to an exclusive report by Variety.

Richard M. Sherman has passed away at age 95. Along with his brother, the legendary songwriter composed music for classic Disney hits including Mary Poppins and The Jungle Book. Sherman was a multitalented writer who also penned screenplays and stage musicals.

Richard M. Sherman has passed away. The legendary songwriter, who composed music alongside his brother Robert B. Sherman (who pre-deceased him in 2012 at age 86) as The Sherman Brothers, is best known for contributing music to more than a dozen classic Disney properties, both live-action and animated, including Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, The Sword in the Stone, and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. Over the years, the duo were nominated for nine Oscars, winning two, for Best Original Score for Mary Poppins and Best Original Song for "Chim Chim Cher-ee."

Per The Walt Disney Company, Richard M. Sherman passed away at the age of 95 due to age-related illness.

Samm-Art Williams, whose Tony-nominated 1979 play Home is being revived on Broadway this year and whose TV producing credits include Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Martin and Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper, died peacefully today in Burgaw, North Carolina. He was 78.

His death was announced by family.

Born Samuel Arthur Williams on January 20, 1946, in Philadelphia, Williams was a prolific playwright, screenwriter, actor, and producer.

Performing as Samm Williams, he got his start on the New York stage in the early 1970s, appearing in notable plays such as Black Jesus and, with the New York’s Negro Ensemble Company, Nowhere to Run, Nowhere to Hide and Liberty Calland. By the mid-’70s he began performing in other Off Broadway shows under the name Samm-Art Williams.

By the end of the decade, Williams had made his mark as a stage writer, and is today best known for Home, a drama originally staged by the Negro...

Who Plays Wally Croker in Netflix's A Man in Full? Meet Actor Evan Roe - Main Image

Netflix's A Man in Full is a six-part limited drama series based on Tom Wolfe's 1998 novel of the same title. In addition to Ozark's Tom Pelphrey and The Good Place's William Jackson Harper, actor Evan Roe plays an important role in A Man in Full.

So who is Evan Roe, the actor who portrays Charlie and Martha Croker's son in A Man in Full? Find out in this article.

Who Is Evan Roe? Where Is He From?

Evan Christopher Roe, popularly known as Evan Roe, was born in Seattle, Washington, on February 9, 2000.

He began acting in musical theater after moving to San Diego, California, and has appeared in numerous productions, including Big River, a 2012 musical rendition of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

As a child actor,...

Perhaps it is somewhat ironic that a story about relationships or friendships also deals with the aspects which keep people apart. Some of the most iconic works in literature, for example, “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” or “Of Mice and Men” on the one hand tell a compelling story about camaraderie and friendship, but on the other hand, through the points which get in the way of two people, authors Mark Twain and John Steinbeck talk about issues like class and how society treats those who are outside the norm. In his 1970 feature “The End of the Track” Taiwanese director Mou Tun-fei uses a similar approach, since the story about the friendship of two teenage boys can, in many ways, be regarded as a metaphor for issues such as social hierarchy, the idea of the social outsider and the high pressure to succeed which puts a great burden on young people.

The Girl Who Cried Monster was originally published in May 1993 (Spine #8) and the series adaptation aired on Saturday, November 11, 1995 (runtime: 22 minutes).

The ultimate escape from authority, responsibility and school, summer break is as precious to kids as any holiday, birthday or celebratory excursion combined. It’s a time of imagination and procrastination, a time for lounging in the sun, riding bikes with friends and endless hours spent in front of whatever screen one might deem fit to watch.

And in that time of freedom and fun, what could be more terrifying than a library?

The Girl Who Cried Monster is one of the Goosebumps series’ earliest entries and remains one of its simplest, concerning a monster obsessed girl and her run-in with a real life creature of darkness who also happens to be the town’s librarian. Combining the mundane annoyances of everyday kid life with the outlandish monstrosities that...

Spencer Mullen Aug 23, 2019

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, American Factory, Avengers Campus, and more in today's daily Link Tank!

Here's how the fourth Matrix movie could resolve the deaths of Trinity and Neo.

"Earlier this week, sci-fi fans the world over were startled and delighted to hear that the long-rumored follow-up to the Matrix trilogy was finally happening. Better still, The Matrix 4 won’t be a reboot or a spin-off, but a direct sequel featuring the iconic franchise leads, Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Trinity (Carrie Ann Moss) with franchise co-creator Lana Wachowski also involved. There is, however, one slight logistical hurdle for the upcoming film to overcome: both Neo and Trinity died at the end of the third film in the trilogy, 2003’s The Matrix: Revolutions."

Read more at Inverse.

Here's why Stranger Things 3 has a great message on female empowerment.

While fans of Netflix’s Stranger Things focused on...

There’s a Fury Road of sorts running through “Buy Me a Gun,” Meso-American filmmaker Julio Hernández Cordón’s orderless, genre-splicing seventh feature, but it’s a bumpy, meandering one; driving along it, you’ll spot “Mad Max’s” desolate, sun-scorched vistas from the windows, passing by at a fraction of the speed. An indeterminately dystopian vision of Mexico in the full control of cartels — whether it’s post-apocalyptic, pre-apocalyptic or merely apocalypse-adjacent is among the many question marks here — the film ostensibly centers on a father and daughter struggling to stick together through a barrage of regimented violence. Yet Hernández Cordón’s narrative is too slender and sluggish to gather much emotional force; wearing such disparate influences as George Miller and Mark Twain brashly on his sleeve, he seems distracted from the task at hand by his smaller, more inventive strokes of world-building. Viewers may follow suit.

Thanks to such well-traveled,...

Tony Sokol Sep 18, 2017

Harry Dean Stanton has died at the age of 91, it was confirmed over the weekend.

Actor Harry Dean Stanton died of natural causes in Los Angeles on Friday September 15th, his agent John Kelly announced. He was 91.

Stanton, who made his breakthrough in Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas, submerged himself in over 250 movies since he began acting in the 1950s. That didn’t make him any less unforgettable, putting his subtle stamp on such films as Cool Hand Luke (1967), Two-Lane Blacktop (1971), Godfather II (1974), Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979) and John Carpenter’s Escape From New York (1981). Plus he taught Emilio Estevez how to boost cars in the cult classic Repo Man.

Stanton hit the mainstream in John Hughes’ Pretty In Pink (1986), he played Molly Ringwald’s unemployed father.

He played against Jack Nicholson, a lifelong friend, in The Missouri Breaks and Bob Rafelson’s Man Trouble. He also appeared in The Mighty,...

First up in Encores 2017 season is Big River The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the Tony Award-winning musical based onMark Twain's classic American novel. Big River will starNicholas Barasch,Patrice Covington,Andrew Cristi,Wayne Duvall,Mike Evariste,Charlie Franklin,Annie Golden, Katherine A. Guy,Megan Masako Haley,Adrianna Hicks,Zachary Infante,Gizel Jimenez,Andrew Kruep,John-Michael Lyles,Cass Morgan,Tom Nelis,David Pittu,Tom Alan Robbins,Horace V. Rogers,Kyle Scatliffe,Christopher Sieber, andLauren Worsham.

First up in Encores 2017 season is Big River The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the Tony Award-winning musical based on Mark Twain's classic American novel. Big River will star Nicholas Barasch, Patrice Covington, Andrew Cristi, Wayne Duvall, Mike Evariste, Charlie Franklin, Annie Golden, Katherine A. Guy, Megan Masako Haley, Adrianna Hicks, Zachary Infante, Gizel Jimenez, Andrew Kruep, John-Michael Lyles, Cass Morgan, Tom Nelis, David Pittu, Tom Alan Robbins, Horace V. Rogers, Kyle Scatliffe, Christopher Sieber, and Lauren Worsham.

First up in Encores 2017 season is Big River The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the Tony Award-winning musical based onMark Twain's classic American novel. Big River will starNicholas Barasch,Patrice Covington,Andrew Cristi,Wayne Duvall,Mike Evariste,Charlie Franklin,Annie Golden, Katherine A. Guy,Megan Masako Haley,Adrianna Hicks,Zachary Infante,Gizel Jimenez,Andrew Kruep,John-Michael Lyles,Cass Morgan,Tom Nelis, David Pittu,Tom Alan Robbins,Horace V. Rogers,Kyle Scatliffe,Christopher Sieber, andLauren Worsham.

New York City Center's Tony-honoredEncoresseries, led by Artistic Director Jack Viertel and Music Director Rob Berman, begins its 24thseason with Roger Miller's 1985 retelling of Mark Twain's classic novel,Big River The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn followed by Cole Porter's 1930 Prohibition rompThe New Yorkers, andThe Golden Apple, John Latouche and Jerome Moross' 1954 reinvention of the Greek epic poemsThe IliadandThe Odysseyinto an all-American fable.

A reviewer for GoodReads offered up her thoughts in a December review of the upcoming Wonder Woman: Earth One graphic novel by Grant Morrison and Yanick Paquette. A negative review took the creators and the publisher to task for what she perceived to be deviant fantasies. Several geek-centric sites, including Bleeding Cool, noted how this sparked conversations and negative comments from fans, both for the anticipated book and the reviewer’s ethics. The review has since been taken down.

These discussions erupted just as I had finished reading The Language Police: How Pressure Groups Restrict What Students Learn by Diane Ravitch. My Aunt Carolyn lent it to me, and I procrastinated in reading it. In the end, I was so glad I read it. It tells the disturbing tale about how interest groups, from both the left and the right, have influenced the content of accepted textbooks in American schools.

Whether you want to belt out showstoppers center stage or work in front of the camera in commercial work, Backstage has you covered. Check it out! “Hairspray” And “Red” You can’t stop this beat! Lost Nation Theater of Montpelier, Vt., is now casting its spring and summer theater productions of “Hairspray” and “Red,” a play by Jon Logan. Lost Nation Theater, an award winning regional theater, is first bringing the house down with “Hairspray” April through May before spotlighting “Red” June 2–19. In addition to housing and pay, the company provides a complimentary gym membership and discounts to local restaurants. Auditions are being held in NYC on Jan. 7 and 8. “Urge” In the Brooklyn area and looking for a fun and fast gig? This online commercial is now taking submissions to cast a number of roles. The ad is selling four products varying from speakers to curling irons. “Across The River:...

Read More: Watch: Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn are Still Causing Mischief in 'Band of Robbers' Trailers In 2016, Tom Sawyer is a parody of a police officer and Huckleberry Finn is a mysterious and weathered former convict. Welcome to the new world of small time crooks in "Band of Robbers," directed by Aaron and Adam Nee. "Band of Robbers" is an updated comedic adaptation of Mark Twain’s most referenced works, "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer." Starring Kyle Gallner, Adam Nee, Matthew Gray Gubler and Hannibal Buress, "Band of Robbers" takes the legendary story and sets it in modern times, proving the timelessness of the works' themes and characters. In an exclusive clip above, Sawyer sports ray-bans and acts as uncomfortably bro-like as can be in the face of the newly released and understandably bitter Huck. "Band of Robbers" hits theaters and VOD platforms January 15. Read More:.

Film producer Samuel Goldwyn Jr has died at the age of 88.

He passed away on Friday (January 9) at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre from congestive heart failure.

Goldwyn Jr was the son of famous film producer and co-founder of MGM pictures, Samuel Goldwyn.

A successful film producer in his own right, his credits include 2003's Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World, which scooped ten Oscar nominations including Best Picture.

Other credits include The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn, Mystic Pizza and The Preacher's Wife.

His final film was The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, which was a remake of the 1947 film produced by his father.

He is survived by his third wife Patricia Strawn and his six children, including Scandal actor Tony Goldwyn and studio executive John Goldwyn.

Samuel Goldwyn Jr, a film producer and executive and son of movie pioneer Samuel Goldwyn, died Friday in Los Angeles. He was 88. The New York Times reported that Goldwyn’s son John said he died of congestive heart failure at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. The founder of the Samuel Goldwyn Company earned an Emmy and a Best Picture Oscar nom during a producing career that spanned 65 years through 2013’s The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty; his father produced the original in 1947.

Goldwyn’s credits include 2003’s Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World, which tallied 10 Oscar nominations including Best Picture. He also was a producer on such films as The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn (1960), Mystic Pizza (1985), The Preacher’s Wife (1996) and Tortilla Soup (2001). One of his rare TV credits was producing the 60th Academy Awards in 1988, for which he was rewarded with an Emmy.

Born September 7, 1926, in Los Angeles...

The Good Lie gets its title from a classroom discussion of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn that takes place halfway through the narrative. Mamere (Arnold Oceng), a twenty-something Sudanese refugee at a Kansas City night school, raises his hand enthusiastically to explain the concept. A “good lie” is told with good intentions, such as when Huck fibs to protect Jim, so that the latter will not be sold back into slavery. Mamere knows all about good lies: many years earlier, during an 800-mile walk from war-ravaged South Sudan to a refugee camp in Kenya, his older brother, Theo, told a good lie. Theo stood up to a pair of soldiers approaching Mamere and his pals, and gave himself up, explaining that there was nobody else with him.

As a result of that “good lie,” the South Sudan orphans could evade capture and continue their walk. It is powerful, poignant moments...

The darkest chapter in American history has always been ripe for the Hollywood treatment, but after Steve McQueen’s searing 12 Years A Slave took Best Picture at the Oscars earlier this year, it seems clearer than ever that there’s still a large appetite for movies about slavery. Luckily, the next star-studded movie about the subject won’t be quite as painful to watch as 12 Years A Slave. Deadline is reporting that Liev Schreiber and Jaden Smith have signed on to star in an adaptation of James McBride’s satirical slavery novel The Good Lord Bird.

McBride’s novel, which won him the 2013 National Book Award, centers on a cross-dressing slave named Little Onion (Smith), a young boy mistaken for a girl when rescued from his master by famed abolitionist John Brown (Schreiber). Together, they set out on a journey across the country, encountering individuals like Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass...

Jaden Smith and Liev Schreiber have signed on to star in the slavery drama The Good Lord Bird, an adaptation of James McBride's book of the same name.

The story centers on a young slave named Henry "Onion" Shackleford (Jaden Smith), who skips town with abolitionist John Brown (Liev Schreiber). Onion travels the nation with Brown, who believes the slave is actually a girl, and his crew of freedom fighters, meeting historical figures such as Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglas on the way to the brutal Harper's Ferry raid that helped set the stage for the Civil War. The book was published last year and was a New York Times Best-Seller, en route to winning a National Book Award. The story is told from a satirical point of view, drawing comparison's to Mark Twain's classic novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Author James McBride, whose book Miracle at St. Anna...

Our annual Sundance Curiosities column takes a look at various movies and filmmakers from the upcoming Park City festival worthy of anticipation. This year, the column is being written by members of the Indiewire | Sundance Institute Fellowship for Film Criticism, who will also review films during the festival. Director Lynn Shelton, whose film "Touchy Feely" premiered at Sundance in 2013, will be back in Park City this year with "Laggies," written by novelist and first-time screenwriter Andrea Seigel and starring Keira Knightley, Chloë Grace Moretz and Sam Rockwell. Showing in the out-of-competition Premieres section, the film is described in the official Sundance announcement as “a coming-of-age story about a 28-year-old woman stuck in permanent adolescence.” While a coming-of-age story (e.g., "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn") about a twenty-eight-year-old woman (e.g., Keira Knightley) sounds like a contradiction in terms, it's a timely spin on a timeless genre, and...

The apocalypse has been a ripe source for comedy in recent years, with three features in 2013 exploring the topic, in the form of Rapture-palooza, This Is The End, and The World’s End. A somewhat less explored genre for comedic tellings are road trip movies, and a mix of the two yields a very limited number of offerings, let alone comedic offerings. Comedy duo Gabriel Diani and Etta Devine are looking to add to that number with their latest offering. The group, who was behind the recent tongue-in-cheek campaign to replace a slur against black people in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn with the word “robot”, is no stranger to filmmaking, with the webseries Mary Olson and their debut feature The Selling already under their belt. In addition, they have managed to assemble an impressive cast, including Barry Bostwick from The Rocky Horror Picture Show and the tv series Spin City,...

Welcome to EW.com’s Ya novel bracket game. We’re pitting 64 young adult books against each other in a March-Madness style game to determine which you think is the best of all time. Round one begins below.

Check out the full bracket and vote!

Little Women The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Ask any young reader to name her literary role model, and chances are she’ll point to Jo March ­a headstrong, hot-headed heroine modeled after Alcott herself. But there’s more to Little Women than Jo alone; Alcott’s domestic tale is truly absorbing, complete with one...

Two boys, river-rats on the mighty Mississippi, run smack into adulthood when they encounter and befriend a fugitive from the law. Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn echoes throughout every frame of Jeff Nichol’s Mud, the festival hit that became one of the summer’s under-the-radar hits. An Arkansas native, Nichols was mesmerized by the river and all that it represents, both in literature and its geographic importance, and his modern-day tale conjures up all the the familiar rhythms, drawls, and characters that filled Twain’s pages. Matthew McConaughey stars as the mysterious rascal whose name is literally Mud,...

"Storage Wars: New York," one of two spin-offs of the popular "Storage Wars" on A&E, premiered its second season Tuesday night (July 9) with the introduction of a new contender -- Big Steve Valenti (right).

In the premiere episode, the buyers headed to Trenton, NJ and Big Steve makes his debut. He runs a Brooklyn flea market and is none too popular with the "Sw:ny" regulars, especially because his preferred bidding method is to bang on the storage lockers' metal doors.

Big Steve did win one locker -- full of candy vending machines, the ones you see in car dealerships and laundromats that have three columns. He figures they're worth $3500.

Harlem is the destination for the second episode. One of the big storylines is Chris and Tad's shop in Hoboken being ravaged by Hurricane Sandy. But they're ready to rebuild and they start with a marble table, a taxidermied turtle...

Two young boys, looking for adventure and a place to call their own, set off into the wilderness and learn a lot about themselves, adulthood, and the complexities of life in the process. This isn’t a new narrative, by any stretch, and its one that has repeated over centuries in popular culture. There is perhaps no better example of the “young boy in nature” story than Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and the novel is the high water mark against which many stories in this vein must be measured.

Every summer seems to herald a number of undercooked, over-exaggerated “trend” pieces about patterns in the films of the summer and about what that says about our culture as a whole. Rest assured, this is not another one of those. Rather, it is an examination of two films that tell similar stories in drastically different ways and with varying levels of success.

Director: Jeff Nichols; Screenwriter: Jeff Nichols; Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland, Reese Witherspoon; Running time: 130 mins; Certificate: 12A

Matthew McConaughey is up to his neck in it - trouble, that is - in the latest in a series of striking performances. His name is Mud and he's a fugitive hiding out on an islet in the Mississippi River, where he's aided and abetted by two boys (Tye Sheridan and Jacob Lofland). It's a stirring ode to innocence that evokes classics like The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Stand By Me.

Sheridan is our eyes and ears on Mud's predicament as the idealistic Ellis, who believes in love despite his parents' constant fighting, while pal Neckbone (Lofland) is being raised by his uncle (Michael Shannon) - a man of earthly pleasures - and takes everything with a pinch of salt. When they discover Mud holed up on the islet,...

Quentin Tarantino's movie is latest twist in debate on racial epithet, but some believe controversy could help race relations

What's "the filthiest, dirtiest, nastiest word in the English language"? According to one of the prosecutors in the Oj Simpson trial, there was no question. It's what many still dare refer to only as "the n-word". Deputy district attorney Christopher Darden submitted that learning that a detective had uttered this six-letter abomination would strip the jury of their judicial faculties.

Elsewhere, courts have ruled that letting slip this word is as understandable a provocation to violence as dealing a physical blow. Libraries and bookshops have purged their shelves of volumes such as Joseph Conrad's The Nigger of the Narcissus. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, in which the word appears 213 times, has been banned from many schools; to overcome this problem, a new edition was published last year with the...

Back in July, our favorite "Wizards of Waverly Place" little brother talked to HuffPost Teen about his next project: a movie reboot of the classic Mark Twain novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Now, the trailer has finally arrived. Watch the video above for a first look at Jake T. Austin in the role of Huckleberry Finn, alongside Joel Courtney (who you may recognize from the movie "Super 8") as Tom Sawyer.

"Filming was a wild experience. For three or four weeks, we were jumping around everywhere in shuttle vans and going to sets," Jake told HuffPost Teen. "It was a lot of fun."

Although the "Wizards" TV show has ended for good, Jake reunited with his cast-mates Selena Gomez, Gregg Sulkin, and Jennifer Stone earlier this year to film a special movie, slated to be released in early 2013. The first TV movie based on the magical kids' series, which aired last January,...

Several big announcements concerning giants of European Cinema broke over the last week, including one bio-pic about a giant of European Art. Let's get to it! We've already reported the news that Werner Herzog is apparently set to direct an adaptation of D.B.C. Pierre's novel, Vernon God Little, The book earned a lot of comparisons to Catcher in the Rye and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, so Herzog won't exactly be in familiar territory, maybe that in itself is more normal for him these days. What is still unclear is exactly how this new affects Herzog's previously announced upcoming projects including his Helmut Newton documentary and his Gertrud Bell biopic with Naomi Watts. Meanwhile, Jean-Luc Godard is experimenting with 3-D for his follow up to...

Werner Herzog, whose next film can always turn out to be about absolutely anything, is set to return to fiction with his next project, an adaptation of Dbc Pierre’s 2003 novel Vernon God Little.

The beloved German director – who has been a prominent force in the filmmaking scene since the 1970s and has amassed a hugely dedicated following – hasn’t directed a fiction film since the strange and relatively obscure My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done in 2009. His last films were the brilliant documentaries Cave of Forgotten Dreams (which focused on primitive cave paintings) and Into The Abyss (an extensive portrait of a Texas death row inmate).

The subject matter of Man Booker Prize-winning novel Vernon God Little seems apt for the Herzog treatment: the story follows a teenager who travels to Mexico after becoming involved in a high school killing in Texas. It’s regarded as somewhat of a black comedy,...

ABC is developing a new tv series based on Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which has its two main characters, now in their 20s, running an investigative firm in a steampunk New Orleans. Sounds great right? Downside: Jason Richman and David Zabel, the duo behind Detroit 1-8-7 and ER are both writing and exec producing. Someone get Joss Whedon on this! [Continued ...]...

With "Sherlock" and "Elementary" bringing Sherlock Holmes back to TV and both The CW and ABC developing "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" updates, it was only a matter of time before Mark Twain's public domain work was plundered for television.

First up? The adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn are the foundation of "Finn & Sawyer," in which the kids meet again as twenty-somethings in steampunk New Orleans.

Naturally, they decide to investigate crime together.

THR was the first to report that ABC is developing the project.Jason Richman and David Zabel, who helmed "Detroit 1-8-7," will write and executive produce. And if Matt Barr (of "Hellcats" and "Hatfields & McCoys") isn't considered for the role of grown-up Tom Sawyer, we will be devastated. Just putting that out there.

What do you think, Zap2it readers? Will "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" serve as strong source material? Jezebel is already...

Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn are coming to the small screen in a new drama from ABC. THR reports that the network is developing Finn & Sawyer, a contemporary take on Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The show is the brainchild of Jason Richman and David Zabel (Detroit 1-8-7 and ER). 

Finn & Sawyer is described as "an adventure-themed reinvention that revolves around the two famed literary characters who re-meet as young men in their 20s and form an investigative firm in a bustling and steampunk New Orleans." Richman and Zabel are set to write and executive produce the project from ABC Studios and Temple Hill Entertainment.

Mark Twain first published the novel in 1884, and has had numerous TV and film adaptations over the years. ABC adapted the the book into a TV movie in 1975 featuring Happy Days duo Ron Howard and Donny Most. Drew Barrymore starred in...

ABC is currently developing a new television drama based on Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, it has been reported. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the series will be called Finn & Sawyer, and will focus on the literary characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn teaming up in their 20s to form an investigative firm in New Orleans.

Executive producers Jason Richman and David (more)...

ABC has given script orders to three very different drama projects from its studio counterpart.  The network is developing Finn & Sawyer, a contemporary take on Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Hollywood Reporter has learned exclusively. The drama hails from Detroit 1-8-7 duo Jason Richman and David Zabel and is described as an adventure-themed reinvention that revolves around the two famed literary characters who re-meet as young men in their 20s and form an investigative firm in a bustling and steampunk New Orleans. Photos: Broadcast TV's Returning Shows for 2012-13 Season

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In case you're curious what inventor Thomas Edison's filmmaking skills were like, watch this 1909 footage of author Mark Twain to find out. Edison captured the author and humorist hanging out with his daughters Clara and Jean at his Redding, Connecticut estate, which he dubbed "Stormfield." This is the only known footage of Twain in existence. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer writer smokes like a chimney, drinks tea, sports a lovely scowl that complements his unruly cloud of white hair, and strolls along his picturesque property for the camera. It's a nice snapshot of celluloid and literary history — which was apparently used in part for a two-reel, 1909 short film, The Prince and the Pauper (based on another Twain tale). Watch the clip...

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This one’s for Martha …

Nothing like a good book to get the rabble-rousers going.

In Field Of Dreams, Ray Kinsella’s wife, played by Amy Madigan, successfully shuts down the effort to ban Terence Mann’s books from the local Iowa school system. Terence Mann – played by James Earl Jones – was based on J.D. Salinger, the reclusive author of Catcher In The Rye.

Catcher was published in 1951, and has pretty much stayed on “attempts to ban it” lists since its publication. In fact, it was the most censored book in America from 1961 to 1982, even though, according to Wikipedia, it was the “second most taught book in United States public schools.” It most recently reappeared on the “most challenged books” list, published by American Library Association, in 2009.

These are some of the books I remember being on the curriculum when I was in school, along some that I missed because...

Clara Bow, Mantrap What do Andrei Tarkovsky, Edward G. Robinson, Clara Bow, Arthur Conan Doyle, and Audrey Hepburn have in common? Easy. They'll all be featured in some form or other at the Library of Congress' Packard Campus in Culpeper, Virginia, in May. [Packard Campus screening schedule.] Andrei Tarkovsky will be represented by the classic sci-fier Solaris (1971), billed as the Soviet Union's answer to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, and by the classic period drama Andrei Rublev (1969), a meditation on art, religion, spirituality, and human brutality and stupidity. A technicality: Solaris will actually be screened on April 27. Edward G. Robinson stars in The Little Giant (1933), a pre-Code crime comedy featuring Mary Astor. The (at the time) energetic Roy Del Ruth (The Maltese Falcon, Taxi!, Employees' Entrance) directed. Clara Bow is the star of Mantrap (1926), a fluffy romantic comedy of interest chiefly because of Bow and because neither of her two leading...

Associated Press A student follows along during an in-class reading of “Catching Fire,” the second book in “The Hunger Games” series by Suzanne Collins, at a charter school in California.

As a professor of American literature who teaches a course on bestsellers, I’m often asked to justify using such “trashy” novels as “Gone With the Wind” and “Valley of the Dolls” in a college classroom. Snobbery towards popular novels is nothing new. Writing in The Guardian in 1713, Richard Steele...

Mark Twain may have published "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" eight years before "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," but don't tell that to Paramount.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, the studio plans on adapting the famous Mark Twain novels into a film called "Huck and Tom."

But! There's a catch: The story will feature Sawyer and Finn as grown-ups, and include "supernatural elements." (Initiate mass groan from literature aficionados.)

"Huck and Tom" is the latest in a long line of Sawyer-Finn film adaptations, and is not to be confused with "Tom and Huck," the 1995 film with Jonathan Taylor Thomas, nor "Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn," the upcoming flick starring Joel Courtney ("Super 8") that Variety reported on last year.

"Huck and Tom" currently has no release date.

[via THR]...

Mark Twain may have published "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" eight years before "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," but don't tell that to Paramount. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the studio plans on adapting the famous Mark Twain novels into a film called "Huck and Tom." But! There's a catch: The story will feature Sawyer and Finn as grown-ups, and include "supernatural elements." (Initiate mass groan from literature aficionados.) "Huck and Tom" is the latest in a long line of Sawyer-Finn film adaptations, and is not to be confused with "Tom and Huck," the 1995 film with Jonathan Taylor Thomas, nor "Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn," the upcoming flick starring Joel Courtney ("Super 8") that Variety reported on last year. "Huck and Tom" currently has no release date. [via THR]...

Val Kilmer is set to play the backwoods literary genius Mark Twain in his one-man show "Citizen Twain," Playbill reports.

Kilmer wrote, directed and stars in the play, that is said to be a mix of the author's biography and a celebration of words and storytelling. The play has been shown in development to audiences at the Disney Concert Hall, Tim Robbins' The Actors' Gang, and The United States Veterans Artists' Alliance Hall.

Though better known for his roles in films like "Batman Forever" and "The Outsiders," Kilmer has had a role in a handful of plays including "How It All Began," a play he co-authored and starred in in 1981.

This isn't the first time Twain, or his works, has been on stage either. One of the most well-known is the 2001 Broadway musical hit "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" based off the book of the same name. "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn...

If you ever wanted to spend a Saturday night watching Batman impersonate Mark Twain at a cemetery, here’s your chance. Val Kilmer will present his one-man play Citizen Twain, which he wrote, directed, and stars in as the legendary author, for a limited engagement at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles.

Each performance will be followed by a Q&A session with Kilmer, whose previous theatrical experience includes an appearance as Moses in The Ten Commandments: The Spectacle Musical and a handful of Off-Broadway shows. There are eight performances scheduled over two weekends — March 23-25 and March...

In honor of Mark Twain’s 176th birthday, Google has posted a panoramic painted Doodle, featuring the world of Tom Sawyer. The Doodle, which replaces the search engine’s official logo on its homepage, includes the writer’s legendary character persuading his friends to whitewash the Google logo. The Doodle also features other characters from Twain’s most memorable books, ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’ and ‘The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.’ The illustration’s folksy style also pays tribute to the author’s illustrator, True Williams. Twain was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens on November 30, 1835 in Florida, Missouri. His family then moved to the nearby Hannibal, which served as the model setting where many of...

Coming-of-age yarn which takes a cue from Mark Twain and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

The Giants is a delicate, thoughtful and charming film depicting a summer in the lives of three teenagers – two of them brothers – in rural Belgium. The three boys, stifled by boring (although beautifully photographed) surroundings and uncaring adults, seek adventure and mischief in typically teenage boy fashion – inviting inevitable comparisons with forebears such as Stand By Me and The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn.

Like the...

Eric Powell has adapted The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Idw Publishing's edition of Mark Twain's classic American novel will be released in November. The Goon creator's illustrated novel version remains true to the original text, unlike a new edition that was released earlier this year, replacing some of the controversial contemporary language of the 19th century original. "How can you censor Mark Twain? Racism is a fact in this country," Powell told Comic Book Resources. "There is no denying it's still a problem. Anyone who wants to deny it... I can tell you some (more)...