Jude Law To Star In Taika Waititi’s New Comedy-Horror Series ‘The Auteur’

Jude Law and Taika Waititi are teaming for The Auteur,  Jojo Rabbit director’s new comedy-horror series in development at Showtime.

According to The Wrap, Law is also executive producing the series. He’ll be joined by Waititi who is pulling triple duty for the series. In addition to executive producing, Waititi will be co-writing the series with Ghost Team’s Peter Warren. He is also set to direct the pilot episode. Whether he’ll be directing more episodes is still up in the air given his upcoming hectic schedule.

The Auteur is based on the graphic novel by Rick Spears, James Callahan, and Luigi Anderson. And it is described as a gonzo horror-comedy, a twisted romance and a glamorous, high wire act of biting satire. It follows the tale of a film producer who in his desperation to make a great horror movie after a massive bomb traps his production in a backlot with a serial killer.

“The Auteur unites the wildly imaginative filmmaker Taika Waititi and the barbed wit of Peter Warren with the undeniable Jude Law in a bloody love letter to the movies that will make you simultaneously die laughing and want to run for your life,” said Amy Israel, Showtime’s executive vice president of scripted programming.

Giving early signals that the network will pick up the project for series, Showtime has already ordered multiple scripts for the series. Aside from Law and Waititi, other executive producers of the series include Peter Warren, Eric Gitter, Rick Spears, James Callahan, and Dan Halsted.

Law is a two-time Oscar nominee for his roles in Cold Mountain and The Talented Mr. Ripley. He also got a Golden Globe nomination for his most recent role in the HBO show The Young Pope. Law is also starring in its second installation The New Pope alongside John Malkovich. On the film side, Law made his marvel debut in 2019’s Captain Marvel. More recently, he starred in Paramount’s thriller Rhythm Section with Blake Lively and in The Nest which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Law is set to reprise his roles in the third installments of Fantastic Beasts and Sherlock Holmes.

On the other hand, Waititi is just coming down from an Oscar win for best-adapted screenplay for Jojo Rabbit which he wrote, produced, directed, and starred in. The film has also kept him busy in the awards season as it also earned a BAFTA and WGA for Best Adapted Screenplay. Waititi has also just finished production on the Searchlight dramedy Next Goal Wins starring Michael Fassbender. He’s now writing and preparing to direct Thor: Love and Thunder. The film is expected to go into production later this year.