DreamWorks Looking to Bring Cropsey Legend to Life
The urban legend of Cropsey was the basis for the films The Burning, Madman, and the 2009 documentary Cropsey, which told the tale of a vile child kidnapper. Just like any good ghoul, he won’t stay dead! In fact… in this latest go-round he might even be kind of funny!
According to Variety DreamWorks and Frank Marshall are developing horror-thriller Cropsey through his Kennedy/Marshall Co. The studio is in negotiations to acquire a pitch from Richard Naing and Ian Goldberg, who will also write the screenplay. Jake Steinfeld is the executive producer.
Cropsey will center on a group of adolescents at a summer camp haunted by an urban legend that dates back to the Colonial period. DreamWorks is developing the story as an Amblin-esque project mixing horror and humor — a la Gremlins and The Goonies.
The DreamWorks project is unrelated to the 2009 documentary Cropsey, written and directed by Joshua Zeman and Barbara Brancaccio about a convicted child kidnapper.
Naing and Goldberg are veterans of the genre, having teamed on the supernatural thriller Autopsy of Jane Doe, starring Emile Hirsch, and Paramount’s Friday the 13th reboot. They also sold a feature adaptation about author H.P. Lovecraft, The Shadow Over Innsmouth, to Amazon Film.
Marshall, who has a first-look deal at DreamWorks, has been a producer on the Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones, Bourne, and Back to the Future franchises.
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