Minecraft Movie Adds Jennifer Coolidge

White Lotus and American Pie star Jennifer Coolidge is set to appear in the upcoming feature film adaptation of Minecraft. The video game adaptation, which is expected in theaters in 2025, is starting to round out its cast as it moves forward in production. There's no word yet on who Coolidge will play -- and not very much of an idea as to just what the movie will entail. Unlike last year's massively successful Super Mario Bros. Movie, Minecraft isn't based on a game that has an obvious story thread to follow. This one feels more likely to be a bit of a light adventure in the vein of Jumanji or Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.

The Minecraft movie will star Jason Momoa, Emma Myers, Danielle Brooks, Sebastian Eugene Hansen, and Jack Black. In an interview published earlier this week, director Jared Hess' wife and co-writer Jerusha noted that Minecraft will also feature "a funny lady, who has not been announced," presumably referring to Coolidge. 

Coolidge, a Hollywood veteran, became a social media darling during White Lotus. The star, who has often played bubbly, enthusiastic women, rarely got the kind of credit fans felt she deserved earlier in her career, but in recent years has earned a Golden Globe Award and two Primetime Emmy Awards. Deadline first broke the news of her casting.

Minecraft is expected to be live-action, but we're not sure exactly how it will be visualized since Minecraft has a very distinctive look, and recent comments by Hess suggest that there will be at least some incorporation of that look, as he talked about wanting to avoid the "Sonic problem," where Paramount's Sonic the Hedgehog movie had to scrap months of work and fully redesign the character after the first trailer dropped.

The movie is being distributed by Warner Bros., and co-financed and co-produced by Vertigo and Legendary Entertainment. Warners and Legendary have had their conflicts in recent years -- Legendary groused loudly about how the studio handled their 2021 release slate, especially as it impacted Godzilla vs. Kong -- but the pair continue to have a number of franchises they work on together, including not just the Monsterverse but also some video game properties as well. Minecraft has been in and out of development since the movie was first announced in 2014, although at this point there are very few people outside of Legendary's executive suites who are still involved from that early version.  

Minecraft is being filmed in Auckland, New Zealand. The movie is set for a release on April 4, 2025.