Zac Efron and 11-year-old actress Ryan Kiera Armstrong spent their summer in Canada filming the remake of Stephen King’s Firestarter novel for Blumhouse. The movie follows the 1984 film that starred a young Drew Barrymore as a young girl who develops pyrokinesis abilities. Many specific details about the upcoming sci-fi horror movie are still being kept secret, but the new Charlie has shared her experience on the film.
Ryan Kiera Armstrong spoke with CinemaBlend’s Nick Venable as she stars in FX’s latest American Horror Story’s latest season, titled Double Feature. When asked about her work on Firestarter, she said this:
Honestly, Firestarter, what a project. It's definitely one of my favorite projects I've ever shot yet. It's honestly so fun on that show. And most of the stunts you'll see - I don't know if I'm allowed to talk about this - but most of them are real, and it's so, so amazing how cool these stunts are. You won't believe it, honestly, how they do these stunts. And working with Zac - Zac is super-duper sweet. I'm so grateful to work with him as well. Also, a very, very humble person, and very, very talented. I'm so glad I get to be a part of Firestarter.
According to the young actress, there are a lot of awesome practical stunts going down in Firestarter. The movie was directed by a fairly new filmmaker, Keith Thomas, who previously made a horror film called The Vigil in 2019. Armstrong sounds like she’s super confident about Firestarter, and getting to work with Zac Efron was a massive highlight. She praised the actor for his character and hard work on the project. She also referenced the 1984 film as well, saying:
Drew Barrymore was fantastic on the last one. I haven't watched the full last one yet. I am planning to, but I've watched clips of it, and what I've seen is pretty good. So I'm really excited to share the new version with everyone.
This version of Firestarter was produced by Blumhouse and Universal following the studio’s string of success in the horror genre, including Halloween, The Forever Purge and The Invisible Man. It is, of course, based on the 1980 novel by Stephen King, but this time it will be a closer adaptation of the book itself than the original movie was, per one of the film’s producers, Akiva Goldsman. Check out Ryan Kiera Armstrong in the role of Charlie on the Firestarter set:
When speaking about the film, Akiva Goldsman also has shared how she thinks the material is one of Stephen King’s “most intimate and affective” projects, especially when it comes to the “expression of hidden feelings.” Prior to the film being shot over the summer, it was in the works since 2017. Some good news is King was shown the script and approved of it before any cameras started rolling.
As the story goes, a father and daughter one the run from a government agency known as The Shop after he and his wife were part of their drug experiment back in college. Succession’s Sydney Lemmon will be playing the wife of Efron’s Andy and mother to Charlie. No release date has been set for Firestarter yet, but we’d expect it’ll come out sometime next year.
