Speak No Evil director James Watkins to mold Clayface movie

Sources told THR that Clayface “is budgeted at $40 million and is a Hollywood horror tale centering on a B-movie actor who injects himself with a substance to keep himself relevant, only to find out that he can reshape his face and form, becoming a walking piece of clay.” That version hews closely to the original Silver Age incarnation of the character, Basil Karlo, who was invented by Batman creators Bill Finger and Bob Kane. Most recently, Alan Tudyk voiced a version of this character on Harley Quinn and on Creature Commandos, though it’s unclear if the Commandos version is also ex-actor Basil Karlo or one of the other versions that has cropped up throughout DC history. 

Speaking of: no word yet on who’s playing the titular role, but James Gunn previously said that the actors voicing the animated versions will also play them in the live action versions. That would be good news for Tudyk… if Clayface takes place in Gunn’s main DC Cinematic Universe. The studio also has “Elseworlds” movies that take place in their own universes, like Matt Reeves’ The Batman. Reeves is a producer on Clayface, so perhaps the new entry will take place in his version of Gotham, not Gunn’s. 

Regardless, THR reports that a film like Clayface “is meant to show the breadth of DC material, from big-budget superhero fare such as Superman on one side of the spectrum to lesser known characters in projects that are more modestly budgeted.” The character of Clayface has the hallmarks of an old-school monster movie that could exist outside of the trappings of DC. Similarly, James Mangold has long been attached to Swamp Thing and has expressed his desire to make a “very simple, clean, Gothic horror movie about this man/monster… Just doing my own thing with this, just a standalone” (via MovieWeb). Done well, this could be a good strategy to set the studio apart from Marvel rivals.