Film Music Reporter

James Newton Howard revealed during a press tour promoting his upcoming concert series that he will be reteaming with director Francis Lawrence on the spy thriller Red Sparrow. The film starring Jennifer Lawrence & Joel Edgerton is based on the Jason Matthews novel of the same name and is set in modern-day Russia in the intelligence bureaucracy. The movie follows a young woman who is drafted against her will to become a “sparrow,” a trained seductress assigned to operate against a first-tour CIA officer who handles the agency’s most sensitive penetration of Russian intelligence. Justin Haythe (Revolutionary Road) wrote the screenplay based on an earlier script by Eric Warren Singer (American Hustle). Steven Zaillian (Schindler’s List, The Night Of) is producing the project with Garrett Basch. Howard has previously collaborated with Lawrence on I Am Legend, Water for Elephants and the last three The Hunger Games movies. Red Sparrows is set to be released on November 10, 2017 by 20th Century Fox.

As previously reported, the composer whose most recent projects is the fantasy adventure Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, also has the Jumanji reboot coming up. He is also set to score Disney’s upcoming live-action movie The Nutcracker and the Four Realms. The film is directed by Lasse Hallstrom (Chocolat, The Cider House Rules) and stars Keira Knighley, Mackenzie Foy, Misty Copeland, Morgan Freeman and Helen Mirren. The movie is based on the classic ballet by Peter Tchaikovsky and the story by E.T.A. Hoffmann and follows a young girl who receives a nutcracker doll from her godfather on Christmas Eve and finds herself thrust into a fantastical world. Ashleigh Powell has written the screenplay and Mark Gordon (Saving Private Ryan, Steve Jobs) is producing the project. The Nutcracker and the Four Realms is expected to be released in 2018 by Walt Disney Pictures.