Idle Hands director Rodman Flender and the writers behind One Tree Hill team to adapt teen zombie novel Eat Brains Love
Gunpowder & Sky along with DIGA Studios and Full Fathom Five announced today that director Rodman Flender has signed on to direct, with One Tree Hill writing / producing team Mike Herro and David Strauss also signed on to write, the film adaptation of Jeff Hart’s zombie road trip novel, Eat Brains Love.
Herro and Strauss launched their career during the first season of One Tree Hill, and remained with the show for the entire run of the series before being promoted to Co-Executive Producers. After nine seasons, they joined the staff of CW’s Reign in its freshman season before moving on to VH1’s critically-acclaimed series Hindsight as Co-Executive Producers. Most recently, the team served as Co-Executive Producers on E!’s first original scripted series The Royals.
Flender comes from a comedy and horror and genre background, which seamlessly translates into what he is working with on Eat Brains Love. He directed the Columbia Pictures release Idle Hands, Tales from the Crypt for HBO, and MTV’s reboot of the Scream franchise. He also directed the hit NBC series The Office and the documentary Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop, which premiered at the SXSW Film Festival. He got his start working with the legendary Roger Corman directing titles such as The Unborn and In the Heat of Passion.
“Herro and Strauss did a fantastic job adapting the source material; the script retains the core DNA of what attracted us to the book, while at the same time creating something fresh and new, injecting into it their truly unique voice,” said Tony DiSanto, DIGA Studios CEO. “I’ve also had the pleasure of working with Rodman in the past on episodes of Scream, and had been a fan prior to that. He is a director with a clear vision and passion for the material. We’re thrilled to have this combination of great talent behind this film.”
Gunpowder & Sky first announced that they had signed an exclusive deal with DIGA Studios, an independent production studio founded by former MTV President Tony DiSanto, and Full Fathom Five to develop Eat Brains Love in February 2016.
The first in a two-part book series, Eat Brains Love is touted as a “heartwarming and bloody blend of romance and deadpan humor” and filled with laughs, heart—and brains.
Synopsis: The good news: Jake’s dream girl, Amanda Blake finally knows his name. The bad news: It is because they both contracted a mysterious zombie virus and devoured the brains of half their senior class. Now Jake and Amanda are on the run from Cass, a teen psychic sent by the government’s top-secret Necrotic Control Division to track them down. As Jake and Amanda deal with the existential guilt of eating their best friends and set off in search of a cure for the zombie virus, Cass struggles with a growing psychic dilemma of her own – one that will lead all three of them on an epic journey across the country and make them question what it means to truly be alive. Or undead.
The film is actively casting as we write this and we’ll have more news as it comes. Stay tuned!
