With Resident Evil doing gangbusters at the box office, it’s no surprise that one of its producers is looking for their next big horror adaptation. Deadline reports that Carter Swan, the producer behind projects like Zach Cregger’s latest and HBO’s The Last of Us, is overseeing a film version of The Crying Boy.
While Resident Evil and The Last of Us both spawned from video games, The Crying Boy is based on the comic series of the same name, written by Niall O’Rourke with art by Rob Moran. Published by indie label Keenspot, the series’ synopsis is as follows:
In this shocking new horror series, Nadia and her son Samir have moved to Queens, New York to restart their lives after the violent death of her husband. In their new apartment, they discover an old painting of a sad, innocent-looking boy. Nadia is reluctant to keep the maudlin canvas, but relents when her son seems to bond with it. The grief-torn family have no idea that within the canvas hides a demon from Hell surviving for millennia by feeding on the souls of children. Thrown into the world of the supernatural, Nadia must overcome her depression and grief and save her son from evil.
“Super excited to work with Carter Swan and develop the project,” O’Rourke told Deadline. “He brings an incredible amount of experience and knowledge to this. We hit it off straight away after he read the script and he was a big fan of the Keenspot comic book series.”
The script for The Crying Boy is written by Rona Mark, and will be one of a number of projects currently in development for Keenspot, who broke into film with the 2022 adaptation of their webcomic Marry Me. Swan, meanwhile, is no stranger to horror, having also produced adaptations like Until Dawn during his tenure with Playstation Productions, along with films like Uncharted.
“The Crying Boy has been one of Keenspot’s best-received titles and we’re ecstatic that a producer like Swan will be helping to bring it to the big screen,” says Keenspot’s Chris Crosby. “It’s a testament to the awesome creativity of writer Niall O’Rourke and artist Rob Moran that this adaptation is attracting talent of the highest caliber.”
No release date has been set for The Crying Boy. Stay tuned to FANGORIA for more updates.
