BBC & NETFLIX TO GIVE DRACULA SOME FRESH BLOOD IN NEW EPIC MINI SERIES! JULIAN FELLOWES TO TELL STORIES BEHIND PORTRAITS IN 'THE ROYAL COLLECTION' SERIES

BBS AND NETFLIX TO GIVE

DRACULA SOME FRESH BLOOD!

Vlad Dracula by Claudia McKinney!

This has been mentioned sometime ago, but now BBC One has announced that they are officially making DRACULA mini series together with Netflix and Sherlock producers Hartswood Films! The series, which will have three hour and a half long episodes, is written and created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss and inspired by Bram Stoker’s classic novel. Three feature length episodes will re-introduce the world to Dracula, the vampire who made evil sexy. In Transylvania in 1897, the blood drinking Count is drawing his plans against Victorian London. And be warned: the dead travel fast. Whom would you like to see in the lead role?

   'THE ROYAL COLLECTION'

JULIAN FELLOWS TO UNCOVER STORIES BEHIND PORTRAITS

So many portraits, so many stories behind them!

Speaking of epic series, Downton Abbey's creator Julian Fellows will make scripted series on THE ROYAL COLLECTION based on the queen's art collection which is the biggest in the world!  As 'Deadline' reports, it will depict stories behind portraits which hang in the royal collection! Every episode will end with the portrait being painted. For instance, one of the stories is a servant who worked for three kings and the queen. Spread across 13 historic royal residencies in the UK, the collection is owned by Queen Elizabeth II and overseen by the Royal Collection trust. There are around 1 million objects including 7,000 paintings and 30,000 watercolours and drawings as well as photographs and furniture.

PREMIUM SPOTLIGHT ON DISNEY'S 'THE NUTCRACKER AND THE FOUR REALMS' WITH MACKENZIE FOY, HELEN MIRREN, MATTHEW MACFADYEN, JACK WHITEHALL! NEW CHARACTER POSTERS!

  NEW 'NUTCRACKER' POSTERS

ARRIVE FROM THE FOUR REALMS!

Nuts will crack November 2nd this year

While we are waiting for Disney to turn its animated tales into live action movies (almost all of the more famous one are in the process of that currently) the fairy tale turned into a big screen adventure that you will first get to see, as soon as next month, is THE NUTCRACKER AND THE FOUR REALMS, adapted by our beloved director Lasse Hallstrom from E.T.A. Hoffman’s classic Christmas Eve tale! It will dance or ballet its way into cinemas starting November 2nd, starring Mackenzie Foy, Helen Mirren as Mother Ginger, Matthew MacFadyen, Morgan Freeman, Miranda Hart as Dew Drop Fairy,

Young Mackenzie Foy takes the lead role of Clara

Eugenio Derbez as Flower Realm King, Jack Whitehall as Harlequin and Richard E. Grant as Snow Realm King. You can see some of them on the

The movie was also based on Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky ballet

enchanting new character posters for the magical fairy tale fantasy. Lasse got a help behind the helm from Joe Johnston who joined the last month of production to ad a few dynamic action scenes and embellish Hallstrom's heartwarming, magical vision!

IN THE NUTCRACKER AND THE FOUR REALMS 
all Clara (Mackenzie Foy) wants is a special key that will unlock a box that holds a priceless gift. A golden thread, presented to her at godfather Drosselmeyer's (Morgan Freeman) annual holiday party, leads her to the coveted key, which promptly disappears into a strange and mysterious parallel world. There, Clara encounters a soldier named Phillip (Jayden Fowora Knight), a gang of mice and the regents who preside over three Realms: Land of Snowflakes, Land of Flowers and Land of Sweets. Clara and Phillip must brave the ominous Fourth Realm, home to the tyrant Mother Ginger (Helen Mirren), to retrieve Clara's key and hopefully return harmony to the unstable world. Try to ignore the atrociously miscast Keira Knightley in the trailer below and her criminally, almost tragically bad voice and pathetic facial expressions.

1ST PHOTO OF CHARLOTTE HOPE AS 'SPANISH PRINCESS' CATHERINE OF ARAGON IN EPIC TV SERIES WITH ELLIOT COWAN, OLLY RIX, ALEXANDRA MOEN! 'A DOG'S WAY HOME' TOUCHING TRAILER IS HERE!

 1ST 'THE SPANISH PRINCESS'

STARZ EPIC TV SERIES PHOTO!

Charlotte Hope plays Catherine of Aragon

Here's an epic update for you today! Drama Quarterly has published the first photo of Charlotte Hope as Catherine of Aragon in Starz' new 2019 epic series THE SPANISH PRINCESS, a sequel to their White Queen and White Princess, which will follow the young princess of Spain who was promised the English throne since she was a child. She arrives in rain lashed England with her glorious court. She is Princess of Wales now, but when her husband Prince Arthur (Angus Imrie) dies suddenly, the throne seems lost to Catherine. Until she claims her marriage was never consummated and that as a virgin she may set her sights on the new heir, the charismatic and headstrong Prince Harry (Ruairi O'Connor) who will one day rule as King Henry VIII. The cast will also include Elliot Cowan as Henry VII of England, Alexandra Moen as his wife Elizabeth of York, Harriet Walter, Olly Rix,

The series will air sometime next year at Starz, I'm guessing spring

Laura Carmichael, Philip Cumbus and others. The mini historical series is also based on Philippa Gregory's novel like its predecessors.

  'A DOG'S WAY HOME' TRAILER

FOR DOG'S PURPOSE FOLLOW UP!

Bella will find her way home next January!

When it comes to trailers, check out the first one for A Dog's Purpose sequel A DOG'S WAY HOME! The follow up to the truly beautiful, heart warming and tear jerking movie directed by Lasse Halstrom, will bark its way into cinemas this winter, January 11th, following a little pup Bella (Bryce Dallas Howard lends her voice to the adorable pooch)  who gets lost chasing squirells and then travels 400 miles in search of her owner. The movie is a big screen adaptation of a book by W. Bruce Cameron and also has Ashley Judd, Barry Watson and Jonah Hauer King in the cast. Dolphin's Tale's Charles Martin Smith is directing. There are some bonds no distance can break, says the trailer:

DISNEY'S LIVE ACTION 'ALADDIN' TEASER IS HERE WITH MENA MASSOUD AS THE LEAD HERO!

 1ST 'ALADDIN' TEASER

REVEALS CAVE OF WONDERS

Choose wisely, says the lamp!

You've probably seen it by now, but here it is at your Spy's lair too: first teaser for Disney's live action version of ALADDIN which will arrive into cinemas next May. The casting process has pretty much turned me away from it, but maybe you will like it. The good news is that the teaser doesn't have Will Smith in it as genie. Mena Massoud plays Aladdin, Naomi Scott is Jasmine! Billy Magnussen is Prince Anders, while Marwan Kenzari is Jafar. The most bizarre of things is that it is being directed by gangsta loving Guy Ritchie. What a disappointing choice for a fairy tale movie.

Unknown actor Mena Massoud takes the role of Aladdin

SLATE OF LIVE ACTION REMAKES
Will Disney ruin this one like they did with mediocre and sadly miscast versions of Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast?  As you know they're also

Famous Cave of Wonders will open worldwide next May

turning animated classics Dumbo, Little Mermaid, Lady and the Tramp, Mulan and Lion King into live action movies.

BRUNA PAPANDREA TO TURN SIGNE PIKE'S MEDIAEVAL SCOTLAND SET HISTORICAL ADVENTURE 'THE LOST QUEEN' ON MERLIN'S SISTER INTO TV SERIES!

 'THE LOST QUEEN' TO BECOME

 MEDIAEVAL EPIC TV SERIES

And even more gorgeous epic projects coming our way, hiphip hooray! As 'Deadline' reports Bruna Papandrea's (Big Little Lies, Gone Girl) production house has acquired TV rights on Signe Pike's historical novel

Simon and Schuster published the book last month

THE LOST QUEEN which was published last month in USA and is seeking international publishers this week at world's biggest book fair in Frankfurt!

THE LOST QUEEN is set in medieval Scotland, a land of mountains and mist, tradition and superstition. It follows Languoreth, a woman born between the ways of the old ancestors and the burgeoning forces of Christianity and the Anglo-Saxons, bent on colonization, encroaching from the east. As she is catapulted into a world of violence and political intrigue, she must learn to adapt to survive, and together with her brother, a warrior and druid known to history as Myrddin (Merlin), has to assume her duty to fight for the survival of her kingdom and its way of life or risk the loss of them both forever.

HENRY CAVILL'S 'THE WITCHER' EPIC TV SERIES FINDS ITS PRINCESSES, QUEENS AND SORCERESSES! JONAH HAUER KING, LESLEY MANVILLE, HELEN HUNT TO LEAD BBC 'WORLD ON FIRE' WW2 SERIES

BBC'S 'WORLD ON FIRE'

WW2 SERIES SETS MAIN CAST!

Jonah Hauer King will lead the cast!

BBC One has revealed the cast for their WW2 series WORLD ON FIRE which will tell the story of the war through the lives of ordinary people from all sides of this global conflict. The 7 part saga tells the story of the first year of the war, starting with the German invasion of Poland in September 1939 and ending with the Battle of Britain. It follows a young translator in Warsaw, a factory worker in Manchester, a war correspondent, a family from Berlin etc. Lesley Manville, Jonah Hauer King, Helen Hunt and Julia Brown will lead the cast next to Zofia Wichłacz, Brian J Smith, Parker Sawyers, Tomasz Kot, Bruno Alexander, Johannes Zeiler and Eugénie Derouand.

NETFLIX' 'THE WITCHER' SERIES

CROWNS ITS PRINCESSES, QUEENS AND SORCERERS

New cast members have also been revealed for Netflix' series adaptation of Andrzej Sapkowski famous epic saga THE WITCHER with Henry Cavill in the lead role as Geralt of Rivia, a solitary monster hunter, struggles to find his

MyAnna Buring and Freya Allan will  be female leads

place in a world where people often prove more wicked than beasts. But when destiny hurtles him toward a powerful sorceress and a young princess with a dangerous secret, the three must learn to navigate the increasingly volatile

Millie Brady and Bjorn Hlynur Haraldsonn will play royalty

Continent together. Freya Allan has been cast as Ciri, Princess of Cintra, Jodhi May as Queen Calanthe, Björn Hlynur Haraldsson as her husband, the knight Eist with Adam Levy as the druid Mousesack! MyAnna

Therica Wilson Read and Anya Chalotra who is the female lead

Buring will lead the magical academy at Aretuza as Tissaia with Anya Chalotra as Geralt's love interest, sorceress Yennefer joined by other novice sorcerers Fringilla (Mimi Ndiweni), Sabrina (Therica Wilson-Read). Millie Brady will be the outcast Princess Renfri.

1ST TRAILER AND POSTER FOR 'HERE AND NOW' WITH SARAH JESSICA PARKER, SIMON BAKER, JACQUELINE BISSET, TAYLOR KINNEY, RENEE ZELLWEGER

  'HERE AND NOW' TRAILER

SARAH JESSICA PARKER, CLIVE BAKER & RENEE ZELLWEGER

It's been a very slow week so far, spylings, so the only thing your trusted spy has for you today are the first trailer and poster for a rather stellar music

The movie is out November 9th

romance drama HERE AND NOW which is scheduled for Northern American cinema release for November 9th! The movie, previously known as The Best Day of My Life and also Blue Night, stars Sarah Jessica Parker, Simon Baker, Renee Zellweger, Taylor Kinney, Jacqueline Bisset and Common.

HERE AND NOW described as an homage to the 1962 Agnès Varda film Cléo from 5 to 7, sees Sarah Jessica Parker in a praised role of a singer in New York who gets a grim diagnosis that puts her life and dreams into perspective. Directed by Fabien Constant (as his first feature movie), this touching drama had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival earlier last April 19! Simon Baker plays Sarah's ex husband and Jacqueline Bisset is her mother.

SF MONDAY: 'REPLICAS' SF TRAILER WITH KEANU REEVES, ALICE EVE! RIDLEY SCOTT TO DIRECT 'RAISED BY WOLVES' SF SERIES FOR TNT! JIM BUTCHER'S 'DRESDEN FILES' SF NOVELS TO BECOME TV SERIES

  NEW SF TV SERIES

BUTCHER'S 'THE DRESDEN FILES'

Fox Television studios will develop Jim Butcher's fantasy novels THE DRESDEN FILES into TV series about private investigator and wizard

There already was a Dresden series in 2007

Harry Dresden, who investigates supernatural disturbances in modern day Chicago where magic is real, along with vampires, demons, spirits, faeries, werewolves, outsiders, and other monsters.

RIDLEY SCOTT'S 'RAISED BY WOLVES'
Over at TNT, Ridley Scott is set to make sf series RAISED BY WOLVES with him directing on TV for the first time. It follows two androids tasked with raising human children on a mysterious virgin planet. As the burgeoning colony of humans threatens to be torn apart by religious differences the androids learn that controlling the beliefs of humans is a treacherous and difficult task.

  'REPLICAS' TRAILER & POSTER

KEANU REEVES CLONING HIS WIFE

You can also check out a trailer and brand new, or rather first, poster for Keanu Reeves' new science fiction thriller REPLICAS in which he plays  a

The film does not have a USA release date yet

daring synthetic biologist, who, after a car accident kills his family, will stop at nothing to bring them back, even if it means pitting himself against a government controlled laboratory, a police task force and the physical laws of science. In short - Keanu tries to clone his dead wife played by Alice Eve! The movie should slowly start hitting cinemas in certain countries around the world this Autumn and Winter. Jeffrey Nachmanoff, who wrote The Day After Tomorrow, is directing this international production. 

PREMIUM SPOTLIGHT ON 'ROBIN HOOD' WITH TARON EGERTON AND JAMIE DORNAN! BRAND NEW TRAILER AND CHARACTER POSTERS!

  'ROBIN HOOD'

 THE LEGEND YOU KNOW...  
THE STORY YOU DON'T!

The movie is out November 21st around the world

This one is coming out exactly 110 years after the first ever movie was shot on ROBIN HOOD but don't expect that it will be faithful to the famous legend of the thief from Sherwood forest who steals from the rich and gives it to the poor! In this one, they're blatantly trying to turn the story upside down and depict Robin as some kind of hood rat and street gangsta. They obviously don't care that someone tried that with King Arthur recently and it flopped miserably. ROBIN HOOD, staring talented young Brit Taron Egerton, will fly into cinemas November 21st almost every where around the world and today you can check out the final trailer below released by Lionsgate!

ROBIN HOOD
sees young Taron Egerton playing Robin of Loxley, a war hardened Crusader, who, with his Moorish commander (Jamie Foxx), mounts an audacious revolt against the corrupt English crown in a thrilling action adventure movie packed with gritty battlefield exploits, mind blowing fight choreography, and a timeless romance.

THE REST OF THE MERRY GANG

Directed by Otto Bathurst (mostly known for celebrating criminals and gangsters in his work, as in Peaky Blinders and now this one), the movie also stars ladies' fave Jamie Dornan as Will Scarlet, the half-brother of Robin Hood, a member of Merry Men and the husband of Marian who is played by Eve Hewson (Susan Sarandon's daughter) and who obviously won't mind being also Robin's love interest. Ben Mendelsohn portrays Sheriff of Nottingham, Robin Hood's infamous enemy. Tim Minchin is Friar Tuck, Paul Anderson is Guy of Gisborne! Bathurst wanted Taron in the lead role so much that he even postponed the beginning of production to fit the actor's schedule. Jack Huston, Nicholas Hoult and Jack Reynor also auditioned for the role. In the film, Robin Hood uses the ancient techniques of speed shooting from the draw hand and the double draw! Unlike the previous 2010 Robin Hood with Russell Crowe which lasted two and a half hours, this one will be a bit shorter than two hours. 

SF SATURDAY: 'UMBRELLA ACADEMY' CHARACTER POSTERS WITH TOM HOPER, ROBERT SHEEHAN! KYLE SCHMID JOINS ALEX PETTYFER IN 'THE I LAND' SF SERIES! EMMETT SCANLAN AS LOBO IN 'KRYPTON' SEASON 2

  'THE I LAND' SF SERIES

KYLE SCHMID JOINS ALEX PETTYFER & KATE BOSWORTH

Kyle Schmid joins the cast of the new sf show

SF news all the way today, spylings, starting with the update from Netflix who have just added gorgeous Kyle Schmid to the cast of their new  THE I LAND sf series which already includes Kate Bosworth and Alex Pettyfer! When ten people wake up on a treacherous island with no memory of who they are or how they got there, they set off on a trek to try to get back home. They soon discover this world is not as it seems. Faced with the island’s extreme psychological and physical challenges, they must rise to their better selves — or die as their worst ones. Kyle Schmid will play a hippie who has a generally laid-back vibe, even in the face of real danger.

  'KRYPTON' SEASON 2

EMMETT SCANLAN IS LOBO!

SyFy has revealed the first look of a new cast member in the second season of their KRYPTON series: Emmett J. Scanlan as the legendary villain Lobo!

Emmett Scanlan will be the crazy wild Lobo

The ruthless bounty hunter who murdered his entire species will appear in the new season of the epic adventure which follows Superman's grandfather back on their home planet. Like Superman, Lobo also has superhuman strength and is almost immortal. As The Hollywood Reporter reveals, season two of KRYPTON will expand beyond Kandor to other planets as Doomsday is unleashed. The Superman prequel will also delve into the origins of Brainiac and get a better sense of the true threat the character poses.

  'THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY'

REVEALS CHARACTER POSTERS

Netflix has, meanwhile, released first character poster for their new fantasy series THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY which will roll out February 15th based on the Dark Horse comic books. It stars Tom Hopper, Robert Sheehan and Ellen Page.

WELCOME TO ACADEMY 
On the same day in 1989, forty-three infants are inexplicably born to random, unconnected women who showed no signs of pregnancy the day before. Seven are adopted by Sir Reginald Hargreeves, a billionaire industrialist, who creates THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY and prepares his “children” to save the world. But not everything went according to plan. In their teenage years, the family fractured and the team disbanded. Now, the six surviving thirty-something members reunite upon the news of Hargreeves’ passing. They have to work together to solve a mystery surrounding their father’s death. But the estranged family once again begins to come apart due to their divergent personalities and abilities, not to mention the imminent threat of a global apocalypse.