With Blumhouse teaming up with Universal to bring their timeless horror characters back to the big screen, they're kicking things off with The Invisible Man, and the title role will be played by a familiar face to fans of Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Hill House.
Multiple outlets, including The Hollywood Reporter, reveal that Oliver Jackson-Cohen will play the Invisible Man in the new movie from Universal, Blumhouse, and writer/director Leigh Whannell (Upgrade, Insidious: Chapter 3).
Perhaps best known by horror fans for his role as Luke Crain, a recovering addict coping with childhood trauma in Netflix's chilling adaptation of Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House, Jackson-Cohen also played Jonathan Harker in NBC's Dracula TV series and John Cantrell in 2012's The Raven.
Jackson Cohen joins a cast that includes Elisabeth Moss, Storm Reid, Aldis Hodge, and Harriet Dyer. Slated for release on Friday the 13th of March, 2020, The Invisible Man is produced by Blumhouse's Jason Blum and Goalpost Pictures' Kylie du Fresne (Upgrade), with Whanell executive producing. According to THR, filming is expected to start this month in Sydney, Australia.
The Invisible Man character was created by legendary author H.G. Wells in his 1897 novella, The Invisible Man. In the novella, a scientist named Griffin engages in criminal activities after performing an irreversible experiment on himself that causes his body to become unseen by the human eye.
The Invisible Man has been adapted for film and television numerous times, beginning with Universal Pictures' 1933 film starring Claude Rains. Universal Pictures followed up their first film with various sequels and other adaptations, including the Vincent Price-starring The Invisible Man Returns (1940), The Invisible Woman, Invisible Agent, The Invisible Man's Revenge, and Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man.
Back in 2017, it looked like the Universal Monsters would be resurrected in a new series of movies, but following the release of 2017's The Mummy, the shared cinematic "Dark Universe" never came to be. While the blueprints for the Dark Universe included films that existed in a shared cinematic landscape, the new Universal Monsters movies are expected to be individual films with an emphasis on horror and distinct creative styles.
In addition to The Invisible Man, additional takes on other Universal Monsters are currently being pitched, and with a large catalog of characters to choose from (including Frankenstein's monster, the Mummy, and Dracula), we might not have long to wait for new films featuring Universal's classic horror characters. We'll keep Daily Dead readers updated as more details are revealed.
Raised on a steady diet of R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps books and Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Derek has been fascinated with fear since he first saw ForeverWare being used on an episode of Eerie, Indiana.
When he’s not writing about horror as the Senior News Reporter for Daily Dead, Derek can be found daydreaming about the Santa Carla Boardwalk from The Lost Boys or reading Stephen King and Brian Keene novels.
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