Edgar Wright in Negotiations to Direct Johnny Depp in Disney’s ‘Night Stalker’

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Edgar Wright is in negotiations to direct The Night Stalker, Disney confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter Wednesday. Johnny Depp is attached to star in the Disney project, a big-screen update of the 1970s television property.

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Wright’s previous film was Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, an adaptation of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s comic book of the same name, which performed poorly at the box office but has found an audience on cable and home video. After Scott Pilgrim and his two collaborations with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, the director’s genre cred is virtually unassailable, making him an ideal choice for bringing the supernatural-themed material to life.

Originally based on the novel The Kolchak Papers by Jeff Rice, The Night Stalker follows newspaper reporter Carl Kolchak who investigates supernatural occurrences. Depp is attached to play the title role (Darren McGavin played him in the '70s TV version) and serve as the project’s producer alongside Christi Dembrowski, Depp’s partner at Infinitum Nihil.

There’s no word how this will affect Wright’s longtime efforts to bring the Marvel Comics character Ant-Man to the screen, but the filmmaker may be paving the way for that project: Disney owns Marvel, so the directing job might be part of a deal to do the adaptation next.