Universal has partnered with Blumhouse and Morgan Creek Productions and spent $400 million to purchase worldwide rights for the Exorcist trilogy, which will star Leslie Odom Jr. and Ellen Burstyn.
According to Variety, Ellen Burstyn be back to reprise her Oscar-nominated role as Chris MacNeil in the 1973 film also named Exorcist. Odom will play a father tasked with finding MacNeil after his child gets possessed.
The exuberant amount of money being spent on the Exorcist trilogy is just another example of big production companies spending hundreds of millions on films or simply IP for the purpose of adding it to its streaming service and hopefully attracting more subscribers.
Universal plans to add the trilogy to its new streaming service, Peacock.
“Blumhouse has always experienced incredible partnership from the team at Universal, and I’m grateful to Donna Langley and Jimmy Horowitz for believing in the vision of David’s film and having the foresight to be flexible with distribution, so the team feels top-notch support through the lifeline of the film. They’re committed to the theatrical exhibition and will also [be] serving streaming viewers well by bringing an exciting franchise like the Exorcist to Peacock too,” said Jason Blum, the CEO and founder of Blumhouse.
“I’m grateful to be working with David Robinson and the great team at Morgan Creek on this iconic franchise.”
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Robinson, the owner of Morgan Creek Entertainment and co-producer for the trilogy, said in a statement, “There’s no better time to be joining forces with the team at Peacock, reuniting with the great team at Universal and finally getting to work with my friends at Blumhouse, than on this classic franchise.”
“David Gordon Green, Danny McBride, Scott Teems and Peter Sattler have put together a compelling continuation of this iconic tale, and I can’t wait to bring this to fans around the world.”
Other large companies have followed this same suit of going big with the streaming purchases.
Netflix spent over $400 million for two sequels to Knives Out, and Amazon bought Coming 2 America from Paramount in October for $125 million.
