Okay, let’s pretend for a minute that your Johnny Depp. You’ve made quite a few movies, are respected as an actor, recognized around the world as a big star and brought Disney a boatload of money for your work as Captain Jack Sparrow in the Pirates franchise. With all that, what do you do?
If you’re Johnny Depp, it seems one of the things you do is get Disney to buy the rights to one of your favorite 70’s TV series with an eye to turning it into a feature film for you to star in. That series? Kolchak: The Night Stalker.
According to reports, Depp is a fan of the series and got Disney interested in a feature version with Depp to star as tabloid reporter Carl Kolchak, a role originally played by the awesome Darren McGavin in the TV movie and subsequent series. Could be interesting with Depp in the role.
In case you’re not familiar with the show, it centered on McGavin as Kolchak, a dogged investigative journalist with a nose for the macabre and supernatural. Even though his investigations often started out normal enough, in most cases they ended up leading him down a dark path into the world of vampires, zombies, werewolves and aliens.
The show was pretty cool, especially for its time, and is often cited by various insiders, including creator Chris Carter, as one of the main inspirations for TV’s The X-Files. I loved the show as a kid and look forward to seeing what Depp and company can do with it.
The project will soon go out to writers. More on this as is develops.
