Typewriters at the ready folks — we’ve just got our first big update on Universal’s big-screen Murder, She Wrote reboot in a long, long time. No, sadly we don’t have any idea whodunnit in the studio’s Jamie Lee Curtis led return to Cabot Cove, but we do know who’s gonna do it… well, who’s gonna direct it at least, anyway. Per Deadline‘s reporting, Pitch Perfect director Jason Moore has been tapped to helm crime writer — and solver — Jessica Fletcher’s return.
Based on the hit, Angela Lansbury starring murder-mystery series that dominated the box across 12 years and a mind-boggling 264 episodes between 1984 and 1996, Moore’s Murder, She Wrote movie is set to see Everything Everywhere All At Once Oscar winner JLC pick up the retired schoolteacher-turned-mystery novelist’s typewriter. And although we don’t have any inkling as to the plot or set-up for the film just yet, on Curtis’ part, the actor — no stranger to a whodunnit having previously starred in Rian Johnson’s Knives Out — has been vocal about her hopes and intentions for the reboot, telling The One Show that she’s keen to bring her own sense of curiosity to the role and forego any attempt at an impersonation of Lansbury’s iconic, 12-time Emmy-nominated performance.
While a script for the next Jessica Fletcher mystery has already been locked down courtesy of Dumb Money duo Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo, it’s unclear just yet when we might expect to see Moore’s Murder, She Wrote hit our screens. That being said, with the recent years’ Murder Mysterenaissance (as nobody is calling it) still very much in full flow, JLC’s star never shinier, powerhouse producers aboard in the shape of Amy Pascal and Phil Lord & Chris Miller, and now Moore in the directorial hotseat, you wouldn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that the answer is likely to be sooner rather than later. And hey, if we get JLC Murder, She Wrote, then maybe… maybe… maybe we can dare to dream that the long-rumoured Mark Ruffalo Columbo movie will follow. And then Murder, Columbo Wrote practically writes itself, right? Okay, we’re going for a lie-down, now.
