Remember all the way back in December 2009 when we first learned that there was going to be an adaptation of Seth Grahame-Smith's Pride & Prejudice & Zombies? If you forgot, I can't honestly blame you. It's now more than three years later and the project has never managed to make any real forward progress, running through directors like David O. Russell, Mike White, and Craig Gillespie, and potential stars like Natalie Portman, Emma Stone, and Blake Lively. Despite the fact that the production has never been able to make two pieces stick, it continues to rise from the dead.
The Hollywood Reporter has learned that Lily Collins is now set to star as the female lead in Pride & Prejudice & Zombies. What's more, Burr Steers, the filmmaker whose previous credits include Charlie St. Cloud, 17 Again, and Igby Goes Down, is now attached to direct. For those unfamiliar with Grahame-Smith's novel, the story is a twist on Jane Austen's classic story, pitting all of the great literary characters against a zombie apocalypse. While the film was originally set up at Lionsgate, it will now be financed by Panorama, which plans on selling the project at Cannes.
Collins, who is known for roles in movies like Abduction, Mirror Mirror and Priest, has a potential big break coming out this summer with the adaptation of the young adult novel sensation The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones. Still, a part of me sees her taking this part after seeing what Jane Levy did with the female lead in Evil Dead, a project Collins dropped.
