Two years ago, it was announced that some of today’s biggest genre companies – A24, James Wan‘s Atomic Monster, the Stranger Things makers at 21 Laps, and Planet of the Apes producers Chernin Entertainment – are joining forces on a new project called The Backrooms, which will mark the feature directorial debut of director and VFX artist Kane Parsons, who is only 19 years old. A few weeks ago, we heard (via Jeff Sneider of The InSneider) that Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave) in final negotiations to star while Cristin Milioti (The Penguin) is in early talks to join him. Sneider’s source told him that Ejiofor’s deal is all but closed, but Milioti’s involvement is 50-50 at this point. Now, Variety reports that A24 has officially given a greenlight to the project, which has Ejiofor attached to star, with Renate Reinsve (The Worst Person in the World) joining him in the cast. It’s not clear if Reinsve ended up in the role that Milioti was 50-50 on, or if Milioti might still have a different role in the film.
The Backrooms is based on a series of viral videos Parsons released through his YouTube channel Kane Pixels. If you were to splice those videos together they would reach feature length, but the feature version of The Backrooms is going to be something entirely new. The screenplay for the feature has been written by Roberto Patino (DMZ).
Deadline previously noted that details as to the plot of the sci-fi horror feature are under wraps. But in the original short, a young filmmaker’s fall into another dimension leaves him wandering through an unsettlingly yellow, empty and labyrinthine office space, which may or may not be home to otherworldly beings. The film’s title and setting draw inspiration from the imagery of a creepypasta (or internet urban legend) published to the website 4chan in 2019. An interview with Parsons on ABC provided the information that his series tells the story of a shadowy organization, called ASYNC, which in the late 1980s opens a portal connecting the real world to The Backrooms.
A24 and Chernin Entertainment are co-financing The Backrooms. Patino is producing the film alongside Shawn Levy and Dan Levine of 21 Laps and James Wan and Michael Clear of Atomic Monster. Alayna Glasthal is overseeing the project for Atomic Monster, while the company’s Judson Scott executive produces.
At one point, Renate Reinsve was set to star alongside Pedro Pascal of The Last of Us in Barbarian director Zach Cregger’s upcoming film Weapons. Pascal had to leave the project so he could star in the Marvel Cinematic Universe reboot of Fantastic Four, and it appears that Reinsve followed him out the door. Hopefully nothing will keep her from seeing The Backrooms through production.
What do you think of Renate Reinsve and Chiwetel Ejiofor taking the lead roles in The Backrooms? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
