Anton Yelchin Scores Lead Role In Fright Night Remake

My favorite thing about Terminator: Salvation, and the only aspect of the film I've had any interest in seeing again, was the performance of Anton Yelchin. In general, I think Yelchin is among the better up and coming actors. He was just cast in The Smurfs (yeah, OK, everybody needs one total gimme) and now he's nabbed the lead role in the remake of Fright Night. Given that the movie is happening at all, I think that's great news.

THR reports that Yelchin got the gig, and says that the Marti Noxon script retains the character's name from the original film. So in Fright Night Yelchin will play Charley Brewster, while in Charlie Bartlett he played, uh, Charlie Bartlett.

The article also confirms Lars and the Real Girl director Craig Gillespie as the man heading up this remake; he'd been previously linked as the helmer, and I'm actually glad that he got the gig. I'm equally happy about Yelchin; given that I'd rather not see the film remade at all, I think he can knock the role out of the park. His involvement says good things about the production as a whole.

There are several really important roles to cast still: we need to hear who'll play Charley's friend Evil Ed, his friend Amy, Chris Sarandon's seductive vampire and Roddy McDowall's key Peter Vincent character. I still wonder how that latter character will be updated. If anyone has the script, by all means send it over to us.

And if you've seen the original (I hope so!) then check out the 2-part Q&A below. This was shot when Diablo Cody programmed the film as part of her mini-fest at the New Beverly. I was lucky enough to be in attendance for this talk, and it was a great time.

I don't post this Q&A idly. THR's article mentions that DreamWorks may be grooming this as a new Disturbia — that is, as a thriller vehicle for a rising young actor. And at the head of the first part of the Q&A, you'll hear original writer/director Tom Holland talk about how he made the film Cloak & Dagger, which was a loose remake of The Window, which was, as he describes, the precursor to Rear Window. Which, of course, heavily inspired Disturbia. Holland came back to the same idea of looking out a window and seeing something next door, and that led to Fright Night.