PHOEBE GALLAGHER
With “The Expendables” back in cinemas and expected to make a wheelbarrow of cash for Millennium, no surprise to hear that there’s interest from other production companies in doing similar-themed projects. And I think you’ll see more and more of these things as the months tick on.
Already there’s a B-version of the films in the works, called appropriately enough “The B-Team”, which unites some of the action heroes of VHS – including Don The Dragon Wilson, Cynthia Rothrock and Mark Dacascos. Bruce Campbell, of “Evil Dead” fame, is also said to be attempting to put together a horror-icons version.
And now, maybe more excitingly, fresh word from Variety that an all-female version of “The Expendables” is also in the works. Yep, tough-chicks-in-singlets the movie! Yes! Yes! Yes!
Just as THE EXPENDABLES 2 explodes into theaters, Adi Shankar’s banner 1984 Private Defense Contractors has tapped Dutch Southern to write an all-female riff on the star-studded action franchise.
Company is already in talks with several prominent actresses affiliated with the action genre.
None of the “prominent actresses affiliated with the action genre” have been mentioned, but one can only assume that Sigourney Weaver (“Aliens”), Linda Hamilton (“Terminator 2”), Michelle Yeoh (“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”), Uma Thurman (“Kill Bill”), Milla Jovovich (“Resident Evil”), Angelina Jolie (“Tomb Raider”), Sharon Stone (“Total Recall”), Lucy Lawless (“Xena”) and Bridget Fonda (“Point of No Return”) would be on the wishlist. Helen Slater, get your agent on the phone! And if you need a newcomer who can hurt with heels…. hey!? Right here!
“The Expendables 2” opens this weekend, and already Millennium Pictures have agreed to bankroll a third chapter in the series. Word from the U.S junket, held last week, is that the producers are hoping to coax Steven Seagal, Harrison Ford, Tom Sizemore and Jackie Chan into the next picture.
