Media Murder for Monday

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It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

The action thriller, Foster, has added six new members to the cast: Dash Mihok (Long Bright River), Randy J. Goodwin (Dynasty), Rhys Coiro (The Penguin), Alexis Knapp (Pitch Perfect), James Frain (Quantum Leap), and Jeremy Luke (The Irishman). As previously announced, James Franco, Ron Perlman, and Natalie Burn will headline the project. Foster is billed as "an analog, 1980s-set action thriller" that follows Donald “Don” Foster (Franco), a man haunted by his past and clawing his way through sobriety, who just wants peace — one day at a time. But when June (Burn), a troubled addict, leaves her young son on his doorstep, Don is dragged back into the violent underworld he thought he left behind. Hunted by his former boss, Brooks (Perlman), a ruthless crime lord who knows every secret Don swore to bury, Don must fight for redemption, protect the boy, and face the sins of the woman who pulled him back in…one bullet at a time.


Charlotte Kirk (The Reckoning) has boarded the action-thriller, The Night Driver, which is filming in New Mexico. Directed by Jeremy Weis (The Teacher), the film follows a traveling salesman (Josh Lucas) who is desperate to return home after surviving a run-in with a psychotic killer, only to be stalked relentlessly by him across the country and framed for several murders along the way. Kirk plays Max, a struggling single Mom bartender with a dark past who has a brief encounter with the salesman which changes her life forever. The script is by John Cork (Blue Moon).


Universal has given a release date of September 24, 2027 to the film adaptation of Miami Vice from Top Gun: Maverick filmmaker Joseph Kosinski. Kosinski’s big screen version will explore the glamour and corruption of mid-80’s Miami, inspired by the pilot episode and first season of the NBC television series that influenced culture and set the style of everything from fashion to filmmaking. The project will be shot in Imax, with casting is underway for a 2026 production start date.


TELEVISION/STREAMING

Nicole Kidman and Elle Fanning are teaming up again to star in Discretion, a legal series written by The Husbands author Chandler Baker. It comes after A24 acquired the rights in a competitive situation with multiple bidders to Baker’s short story, "Discretion," which is yet to be published. Baker will adapt the fictional short story set in Dallas, which is inspired by her experience as a corporate attorney, having also worked for a major sports franchise.  


Agatha Christie is best known for her two series featuring Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. But she also wrote a few other mysteries, including Christie’s largely forgotten 1929 thriller, The Seven Dials Mystery. The tone is far more bubbly than her other writing, centering on a giggling group of fresh-faced aristocrats, a secret society who all wear masks with clocks on their faces, and a dastardly international espionage plan incorporating secret formulas for airplanes. Critics at the time were not enthused about the work since it deviated from her usual tightly plotted detective stories, and it's only been adapted once before, in an equally forgotten effort from 1981. But Netflix hopes to change all that with a new three-part adaptation in January. Although officials at Netflix aren't saying much about future installments, there are indications it may be planned as a series. The impressive cast includes Mia McKenna-Bruce as the main protagonist, Lady Eileen "Bundle" Brent; Helena Bonham-Carter as Bundle’s aunt, Lady Caterham; Edward Bluemel as the handsome young gadabout and Bundle’s sleuthing partner Jimmy Thesiger; and Martin Freeman as Superintendent Battle.


Glassriver, the leading Icelandic film and TV production company behind Reykjavik Noir, has optioned the bestselling "Konrad" book series from Arnaldur Indriðason, the successful author of Operation Napoleon and Jar City. The banner will be making a TV series based on the seven-book series, whose story follows a retired Reykjavík detective haunted by his own troubled past while solving cold cases. Though no longer working for the police, Konrad finds himself unable to ignore the unresolved crimes that continue to haunt both victims and their families. This marks the first TV series adaptation of Indriðason’s work, although Operation Napoleon and Jar City were turned into films.


Ben Stiller and Jessica Chastain will star in the new thriller series The Off Weeks from showrunner Alissa Nutting and director Michael Showalter for Apple TV+. The drama follows new divorcé Gus Adler, a writing professor struggling to keep it together amid massive change. As Gus tries to manage the "on weeks" where he’s given custody of his children, he begins falling in love with the mysterious Stella West during his off weeks.


Dougray Scott (Mission: Impossible 2) will play iconic Danish author Hans Christian Andersen in Fairytale Detective, a new crime drama series from writer Brendan Foley and Omega Global Media. Each one-hour episode follows Andersen as he solves crimes in 1850s Copenhagen aided by a coterie of characters from his stories, who come to life to help him find justice. While embarking on his unusual hobby, he hopes to convince Jenny Lind, the love of his life, to marry him.


Another actor with ties to the Dick Wolf universe has joined the CBS's upcoming drama, CIA. Natalee Linez, who did an arc on Chicago P.D., is set as a series regular opposite Tom Ellis, Chicago Med alum Nick Gehlfuss, and Michael Michele on the FBI offshoot. CIA centers on two unlikely partners – a fast-talking, rule-breaking loose cannon CIA case officer (Ellis), and a by-the-book, seasoned and smart FBI agent (Gehlfuss) who believes in the rule of law. When this odd couple are assigned to work out of CIA’s New York Station, they must learn to work together to investigate cases and criminals posing threats on U.S. soil, finding that their differences may actually be their strength. Linez is playing Gina Rojas, a trusted CIA analyst on the team; Michele plays the head of CIA’s New York Station. CIA is scheduled to debut in midseason 2026.


Netflix has shared the teaser trailer for The Beast in Me, the upcoming mystery thriller miniseries, which hails from producers Conan O’Brien and Jodie Foster. All eight episodes will be available for streaming starting on November 13. The video introduces Emmy and Golden Globe winner Claire Danes as an author whose mysterious neighbor (Matthew Rhys) becomes the subject of her next book.


Amazon has renewed the YA series, We Were Liars, for a second season, two months after the mystery-thriller launched on Prime Video. The drama is an adaptation of E. Lockhart’s bestselling book and follows Cadence Sinclair Eastman and her tight-knit inner circle, nicknamed the Liars, during their summer escapades on her grandfather’s New England private island. The Sinclairs are American royalty—known for their good looks, old money, and enviable bond—but after a mysterious accident changes Cadence’s life forever, everyone, including her beloved Liars, seems to have something to hide.

PODCASTS/RADIO/AUDIO

On Crime Time FM, Guy Hale chatted with Paul Burke about The Shakespeare Murders; Stratford theatre; indie publishing; dodgy 70s cops, and more.


Read or Dead hosts Katie McLain Horner and Kendra Winchester discussed books by women writers for Latine Heritage Month.


The latest Mysteryrats Maze podcast featured the first chapter of Murder at the Royal Albert by Gerald Elias, read by actor Ariel Linn.


Want to know what the wet-dog shakes have to do with humans? What drug reaction causes a temperature so high it can cook the proteins inside your body? What over the counter medicine can cause a potentially life-threatening reaction with SSRIs? Find out on the latest Pick Your Poison podcast.