Johnny Depp follows Twilight with new vampire film

[HMG] – With the rare combination of Johnny Depp, Twilight-style vampires, sci-fi and classic TV you would think a film that blended all three would be assured a green-light. But Johnny’s latest project has been stalled for three years.

In the summer of 2007, Mr. Depp and his production company, ‘Infinitum-Nihil’ bought the rights to ABC’s 1966 sci-fi classic, Dark Shadows. It’s been stuck in that special level of hell Hollywood calls ‘development’ ever since, but now they’ve made progress – Seth Grahame-Smith has signed on to create the first draft of a script.

Any Twilight fan not familiar with Mr. Smith’s work really should be — In March he released “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter,” which is now being turned into a film by Tim Burton. That followed his 2009 tale “Pride and Prejudice, and Zombies” — a re-telling of Jane Austen’s classic novel from 1813, but with added “Ultra-violent Zombie mayhem,” so the book’s jacket claims.

Seriously — if you love vampires and odd people, you should read this!

Dark Shadows was a Gothic soap-opera that concerned the Collins family, from Collinsport, Maine. Daily life at Chez Collins involved everything from witches to werewolves. Then a distant cousin arrives from England and it turns out he’s a vampire.

Then it gets weird.

The series debuted on ABC in June 1966 and ran for 1,225 shows, before it passed into folklore in 1971. Johnny obtained the rights from the estate of the show’s late producer, Dan Curtis, and has been fighting to get it made ever since.

Variety says there’s no date for release yet, but with Johnny and vampires involved you can bet Warner Brothers will keep us amply informed…