News Briefs

- Newsarama.com has an interview with producer Barry Levine whose upcoming projects include “Rex Mundi” through Johnny Depp’s production company. Thanks to Kimberly for the link!

NRAMA: Okay, so Rex Mundi and Johnny Depp. How did you manage to get that set up?

BL: I met Arvid Nelson and Eric J at Comic-Con four years ago as an independent producer and fell in love with the concept, the writing and the artwork. While every other producer was looking for comics that were easy to adapt to film, there’s me picking up one of the most hardest to adapt projects out there. But I just loved it. I really wanted to make it work.

I spent a year trying to get studios interested in it. They all said the same thing… Too dark, too ambitious and too hard to sell. But I have a tattoo on my arm that says, “Who does not hope to win has already lost.” It’s not there for nothing. I wasn’t going to let Arvid, Eric or myself down.

While I was at Dark Horse Entertainment, this was one of the projects that I brought in as part of my deal. Mike (Richardson) saw the same potential as I did and helped get behind the project. I then brought in a friend of mine that I had developed a few projects with before, Alan Riche [MouseHunt, Starsky and Hutch], who brought it to Johnny’s agent at UTA who sent it over to Infinium Nil [Johnny Depp’s production company]. Johnny read the comics, he had already been researching that time period and characters. Once we had established that relationship we worked very closely with Sam Sarkar, who runs development for Johnny. When we sat down with Johnny he fell in love with Eric J’s artwork and that pulled him into the story. Once we had Johnny interested in this as a project for him to star in Jon Levin at CAA suggested a meeting with Jim Uhls [Fight Club]. Johnny, Sam and Jim had several conversations that resulted in Jim coming onboard as the screenwriter.

NRAMA: What can you tell us about their take?

BL: Absolutely nothing. No if I want to keep working in this town. All I can say is that with the combination of talent that has been brought together on this project, you couldn’t ask for anything more.

- ABC.com.au offers an article about Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in its Movie Minutiae section, asking for opinions on the book versus the film.

- EW.com has an interview with Tim Burton in which he briefly mentions working with Johnny in the upcoming Sweeney Todd film. The interviewer asks if Burton foresees a time when he and Johnny will be sick to death of each other. Burton laughs: “No. I’ve been through enough with him, and he’s pretty open to things, and that’s the exciting thing about working with him.”