The Hollywood Houdini Scrum Welcomes New Film

Last month came word of a movie about Harry Houdini and Arthur Conan Doyle fighting crime together, and another about Houdini's work with the Secret Service. And now there's one that aims to focus on Houdini's gifts as a showman.

Director Francis Lawrence ("Water for Elephants," "I Am Legend") hopes to helm a biopic about the famed magician, reported Variety. But he'd better put the pedal to the metal, because even if he gets hired today, he's already five weeks behind the competition.

Summit has already hired Noah Oppenheimer to adapt "The Secret Life of Houdini, The Making of America's First Superhero," the 2006 biography by William Kalush and Larry Sloman.

And "Voices From the Dead," a script by J. Michael Straczynski ("The Changeling"), based on the real-life friendship between Houdini and Arthur Conan Doyle, is also in the works. Set in the 1920s, the film follows the duo as the fight crime in new York City alongside a psychic.

Maybe the studios should agree to sit on at least one of there projects until the time comes for the Houdini reboot.

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