Danielle Panabaker (Friday the 13th) and Joe Anderson (Across the Universe) have joined Timothy Olyphant (TV’s “Damages,” Hitman) and Radha Mitchell (Silent Hill, Pitch Black) in Overture Films’ The Crazies, a reinvention loosely based upon the George Romero classic, the studio announced today. The film is set to begin principal photography in Georgia on March 5th with additional shooting to occur in Iowa.
Panabaker, who is coming off her recent starring role in the slasher blockbuster hit Friday the 13th and previously appeared alongside Kevin Costner and Demi Moore in Mr. Brooks, plays Becca, a receptionist at the town’s medical center where Mitchell is a doctor. Panabaker’s other credits include the TV show “Shark,” and the acclaimed HBO mini-series “Empire Falls.”
Anderson, whose previous credits include The Ruins and Becoming Jane, will appear in Mira Nair’s upcoming Amelia Earhart biopic Amelia,/b>. In The Crazies, he takes on the role of the town’s deputy, with Olyphant playing the sheriff.
Breck Eisner is set to direct the screenplay about the inhabitants of a small Kansas town beset by insanity and then death after a mysterious toxin contaminates their water supply. The film is written by Ray Wright, from an earlier draft by Scott Kosar.
