Mike Fleming

Dead Spy RunningEXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros has set Adam Wingard to direct and his partner Simon Barrett to rewrite Dead Spy Running, a fast-tracked project that is being produced by Kevin McCormick at Langley Park and McG’s Wonderland Sound And Vision. Based on the series of novels by Jon Stock, Dead Spy Running follows Danny Marchant, a young DJ on the rise in the international world of electronic dance music. Danny is forced to go on the run with a beautiful secret agent assigned to watch him after he is framed for his MI6 agent father’s murder. As Danny tries to clear his name and avenge his father’s death, he gets deeper into the world of espionage while never forgetting his background and skills as a DJ. Danny must ultimately rise up and defeat a terrorist intent on destroying western civilization in an adventure that takes him through the world to London, Paris, Corsica, New York, and Mumbai.

Barrett will rewrite the latest draft, with previous drafts done by Stephen Gaghan and Jamie Moss. CAA-repped Wingard and Barrett are best known for the micro-budget Toronto 2010 serial killer drama A Horrible Way To Die, which was released by Anchor Bay. They followed with Autoerotic and You’re Next, the latter of which Lionsgate will release next year. Wingard and Barrett also collaborated with producer Brad Miska to conceive the anthology film V/H/S, which premiered at 2012 Sundance, with Magnolia buying to release this fall.

As for McCormick, he’s producing Gangster Squad, which will be released January 11 and just had its first test screening after the reshoot of footage necessitated by the theater shooting in Aurora, and he’s producing with Gail Berman Rent-A-Ghost, which has Madagascar 2′s Tom McGrath directing Ben Stiller. He’s also producing the stage musical Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, which Sam Mendes is directing and which will premiere at London’s Drury Lane Theatre on June 25 before it heads to Broadway.