Radio Silence, the filmmaker group that includes Tyler Gillett, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, and Chad Villella, is set to direct a new Escape From New York.
Thankfully for many fans, Entertainment Weekly has reported that the film wouldn’t be a remake. Radio Silence is adding to their ranks of “requels” (a term coined in their 2022 film Scream) and letting the film exist in the same universe as the original.
When asked by EW if the new movie will be a sequel or a remake, Tyler Gillett set the record straight, stating: “Not a remake. That’s one of those properties that you can’t [remake]; it’s sort of untouchable to us and lives in its own stratosphere in terms of how important it is to us and how much we love it. So it’ll be not unlike Scream, I think, a nod to, and a continuation of, what we love about those characters and that world.”
While they know where the film exists alongside the original, Chad Villella says they are still early in the project’s development, calling it the “very, very early stages” before adding that “we’re very excited to be working with 20th Century on that. We’re developing our take, and hopefully, it will be going to script sometime in the New Year, and just really starting to lay the groundwork for that. But very early stages.”
It took a while to get to the point with a new entry from 1981’s Escape From New York. Following the 1996’s sequel Escape From L.A., the planned film Escape From Earth never panned out. In 2015, EW confirmed that Neil Cross had been hired to write a new series entry, then in 2017, Robert Rodriguez took over the reboot. Lastly, Leigh Whannell had plans to pen a new installment, but the film eventually went to Radio Silence.
The filmmaking collective is on a roll as of late. The trio made the fan-favorite Ready or Not and followed it up with the fifth installment in the Scream franchise. Before they attempt to escape from New York, Radio Silence will direct an NYC-themed Scream movie, Scream VI, and you can watch the teaser trailer here.
