Lovecraft Country's Jurnee Smollett and Misha Green Reuniting for New Movie
Lovecraft Country and Underground collaborators Jurnee Smollett and Misha Green are reuniting for their next project. On Tuesday, Lionsgate officially announced Sunflower, a new film that will star Smollett and be written, directed, and produced by Green. The film will reportedly be the next project for both Smollett and Green, with Lionsgate aiming to begin production at some point this summer. Meredith Wieck and Aaron Edmonds will oversee the project for Lionsgate. In Sunflower, two women struggle to escape from a deranged college professor who holds them hostage on a remote sunflower farm.
"Sunflower was the first script I sold when I landed in Hollywood, and now having the opportunity to make it my first feature directorial outing feels like kismet," Green said in a statement. "I couldn't have hoped for better partners and collaborators than Nathan, the Lionsgate team, Craig, and Jurnee to help me shepherd it to the big screen."
"Everyone at our studio was completely drawn in by the way Misha, Jurnee, and the Lovecraft Country team worked so confidently to create a compelling genre series – then subverted the genre and reinvented it through a new lens," Nathan Kahane, president, Lionsgate Motion Picture Group, added. "That's the opportunity with Sunflower. The screenplay is unique, thrilling, and flat-out scary. It's going to make a hell of a movie."
Will there be a Black Canary movie?
Sunflower will be the latest project that Smollett and Green work on together, in addition to a Black Canary solo movie that has been in development since the summer of 2021. Spinning out of the events of 2020's Birds of Prey, Black Canary would be written by Green and would star Smollett as the titular hero, who fights crime with the help of her martial arts skills and high-powered sonic cry. While the film is not a part of DC Studios' recently-announced "Chapter One: Gods & Monsters" slate, fans have been excited by the possibility of it happening.
"I can't talk about it, as you know," Smollett explained in a laugh in an interview last year. "But I can say I really am excited about what we're developing."
"Truly, one of the great joys of my professional career has been playing Black Canary and to see the response from the fans online and engaging on Twitter," Smollett revealed. "They are a massive reason why I am where I am, and any excitement I have about continuing on the Black Canary trajectory, it's being made possible because of the fans."
What do you think of the first details surrounding Sunflower? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!