Woody McClain Joins ‘The Harder They Fall’; Luke Barnett Lands ‘Jacir’ & ‘Whose Child’ – Film Casting Briefs

Amanda N'Duka
·3 min read
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Woody McClain, who currently appears in the Starz Power spinoff, Power Book II: Ghost, has been added to the cast of The Harder They Fall. The Netflix western stars Idris Elba, Jonathan Majors, Zazie Beetz, Lakeith Stanfield, Delroy Lindo, Danielle Deadwyler, Edi Gathegi, RJ Cyler, and Oscar winner Regina King. Jeymes Samuel, who co-wrote the screenplay with Boaz Yakin, is directing the pic. It’s about an outlaw Nat Love (Majors) who discovers that the man (Elba) who killed his parents two decades ago is being released from prison, he reunites with his gang to track his enemy down and seek his revenge. Jay-Z, James Lassiter, Lawrence Bender, and Samuel are producing. McClain’s other credits include The Bobby Brown Story, The New Edition Story, and indie comedy Death of a Telemarketer.

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Faith Based star Luke Barnett has signed on for two indie dramas, the Waheed AlQawasmi-directed Arabic/English-language drama Jacir, and Whose Child from director Roxy Shih. Also starring Lorraine Bracco, Malek Rahbani, and Jaime Gallagher, Jacir explores the life events between Jacir, an orphaned Syrian refugee who settles in a rough neighborhood in Memphis, and Meryl (Bracco), an opioid addicted ultra-conservative shut-in who is fearful of immigrants and minority families in her area. And the unlikely friendship that develops between Jacir and Meryl, as they both learn that they have more in common than they thought. In Whose Child, Anna Schafer stars as a woman working in public relations at a children’s hospital who gets her life turned around when she is assigned to be an “Auntie” for a young boy named Billy, who is suffering from heavy head trauma and is barely hanging on to life. When she realizes that the incident was a domestic abuse case, she takes matters into her own hands to overturn a system that would have otherwise failed him. Amy Williams and AlQawasm are producing Jacir, while Autumn Federici and Jake Helgren are producing Whose Child under their The Ninth House label. Barnett is repped by Stride.

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Michael Obiora (Tomb Raider) and Colby Boothman (Jurassic World) have been cast opposite Camilla Rutherford, Greta Bellamacina and Alain-Fabien Delon in Ultra Pure from writer and director Ulla Fudge. The pic is set in the heart of London where an Ultra Nationalist group plotting terror against the LGBT community, lurks within the walls of a failing Tower Block. When their leader, Romeo, unknowingly falls for a resident drag queen, love blinds prejudice and throws loyalties into question. The owner of the Tower Block befalls her own disarray, risking all she has to survive. Luana Di Pasquale and Fudge are producing.

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Actor Paul Mormando (Bound By Debt) has joined the cast of Z Dead End, an indie horror thriller written and directed by Robert Resto. George Lazenby, Robert Lasardo, Felissa Rose, Robert Allen Mukes, and Roger Corman are also part of the cast. The plot is set July 4, 2015, the end of the world. Without any warning, bodies begin dropping from the sky, colliding with the ground, only to rise once more. The bodies are swiftly determined to be zombies, and they’ve invaded Earth. No one knows why the zombies have arrived, except for a mysterious little girl named Emily. As humanity continues to fall at the hands of these monsters, a few people are determined to survive the invasion. Cinema Factory is producing the project in conjunction with Resto.

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