New Scream Adds Courteney Cox as Gale Weathers

Courteney Cox will return to the Scream franchise, reprising her role as Gale Weathers, a journalist who has been a key part of the story from the beginning. This means that Cox will join David Arquette, another Scream veteran who is set to reprise his role as Dewey Riley, a local cop who tries to be much cooler than he is. There's little known so far about the plot of the movie, which was at one point referred to as a reboot but now appears to be more in the spirit of the more recent Hallowween sequels, which are set in the same continuity as the first but blaze their own trails.

The fillm is set to be directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett of Radio Silence, best known for their work on last year's horror comedy Ready or Not. The screenplay was written by The Amazing Spider-man's James Vanderbilt and Castle Rock's Guy Busick. Scream Kevin Williamson and the third member of the Radio Silence trio, Chad Villella, will serve as producers on the film.

"We can't imagine Scream without the iconic Gale Weathers and are so incredibly thrilled and humbled to have the opportunity to work with Courteney," Radio Silence told Deadline in a statement. "We're absolute mega fans of her work and we're so excited to join her in the next chapter of the Scream saga!"

The intent seems to be to bring back Neve Campbell, too. Campbell, who played franchise heroine Sidney Prescott. Over the years, Campbell had expressed some reservation about returning to Scream again, particularly following the passing of the original film's director, Wes Craven. More recently, though, she seems to have hinted that she is in talks to return.

"I got this really, really respectful letter from the directors of the new one," Campbell recently told The Hollywood Reporter. "They came to me with Scream 5, and these directors are incredibly talented. They wrote a letter honoring Wes in such a beautiful way, and they expressed that the reason they make horror movies is because of Wes and the Scream films. They also expressed how blown away they are at the idea of actually getting an opportunity to make one of them and how much they want to honor and respect Wes' vision. It was just beautiful, and I was really grateful."

She continued, "I had really thought that the only way I'd step into a new project with new directors is if they really wanted to honor him. So, we'll see. We're just in the beginning phases of negotiations, and we'll have to see where it goes with COVID and everything. There are a lot of things up in the air such as when we'll actually get to make the movie and how we can even reenter this business at the moment."

Stay tuned for details on the new Scream before it hits theaters in 2021.

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