John Ridley Directing & Writing Untitled Paranormal Feature For Blumhouse – BlumFest

12 Years a Slave Oscar winner John Ridley is writing and directing an Untitled Paranormal Project for Blumhouse, based on the recently published Truly*Adventurous article “Project Poltergeist” by Saleah Blancaflor.

Blumhouse recently acquired the rights to develop a feature film based on the article which explores the unexplained events that terrified a young boy in New Jersey during the 1960’s, the first alleged haunting in a public housing project.

“This is an incredible true-life narrative of a young man dealing with horrors – both paranormal and racially systemic – in a community that is scarred by hate, yet ultimately brought together by hope. I really appreciate Blumhouse’s commitment to telling stories that seek to entertain audiences even as it challenges them,” said Ridley.

“The best scary movies are always based on a real event, and we were very compelled by the material this story is based on. I also know that John Ridley is as good as you get as a dramatic storyteller, so we’re confident that infusing this story with John’s brand of drama is a great bet,” said producer Jason Blum

Founded by Nichols and Pearl, Truly*Adventurous is a nonfiction lab conceived in a spirit of adventure and built with reckless faith in the power of true storytelling. The company commissions original works from the world’s best nonfiction artists and has two dozen projects in various stages of development in film and television.

“Here at Truly*Adventurous we’ve been innovating ways to discover and tell true narratives in spaces such as horror that have been ignored by traditional media. We’re so excited to be working with these exceptional creative collaborators to bring such a thematically rich and timely Truly*Horror story to a wide audience,” said Matthew Pearl and Greg Nichols.

Jason Blum will produce for Blumhouse. Pearl and Nicholas are EPs. The film will be produced by Blumhouse in association with Truly*Adventurous.

Ridley’s critically acclaimed documentary about the Los Angeles uprising, Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982-1992, recently re-aired on ABC, following its initial premiere in theaters and on ABC three years ago. It is also available on Netflix. Ridley won the adapted screenplay Oscar for 12 Years a Slave. He also wrote and directed the innovative Jimi Hendrix biopic All Is By My Side, and was the creator, director, and executive producer of ABC’s Emmy-winning anthology series American Crime. Ridley is currently under an overall deal with ABC Studios, a division of Disney Television Studios. It was recently announced that he will write, direct and executive produce an untitled musical drama for Showtime, along with Alicia Keys. He is also currently working on Black No More, a new musical with The Roots’ Tarik Trotter (aka Black Thought). In the fall of 2018, Ridley opened NO Studios, a space for the arts and community, in his hometown of Milwaukee.

Ridley is repped by Brillstein Entertainment Partners and Rohner Walerstein. Truly*Adventurous is represented by Pouya Shahbazian at New Leaf Literary and JR McGinnis at Felker Toczek Suddleson Abramson.

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