WB and DC's Zatanna movie gets a writer: Promising Young Woman director and The Crown star Emerald Fennel

By Tatiana Tenreyro  |  March 22, 2021 | 7:29pm
Film Features Zatanna
WB and DC's Zatanna movie gets a writer: Promising Young Woman director and The Crown star Emerald Fennel
Emerald Fennell at the 2020 Golden Globes Photo: Frazer Harrison

Promising Young Woman feels like a gritty superhero flick. It has a fearless heroine with a taste for vengeance and thrilling action scenes. So it shouldn’t come off as much as a surprise that Oscar-nominated Promising Young Woman director and writer Emerald Fennell has now been announced as the writer for DC’s awaited Zatanna movie for Bad Robot and Warner Bros. Deadline broke the news and noted there’s no word yet on whether Fennell will also direct. No details have been shared about what the plot will entail, either.

DC Comics’ Zatanna first made her debut in the November 1964 issue of Hawkman, created by Gardner Fox and Murphy Anderson. She’s a stage magician who actually has magical powers and at one point in the comics joined the Justice League. Her dad, Zatara, was the one who taught Batman everything he knows about the art of escaping from bad guys, so Batman and Zatanna have been pals since way back. She even makes an appearance on Batman: The Animated Series. Zatanna was also romantically involved with fellow superhero magician John Constantine. The character got her first live-action portrayal in Smallville’s eighth season, played by Serinda Swan. Now that the Zatanna movie is official, we’ll just have to wait to see who’ll play the magical heroine.

Fennel is currently nominated for three Academy Awards for writing, directing, and producing Promising Young Woman—as well as a Screen Actors Guild award along side her costars of The Crown, on which she play Camilla. Fennel’s stellar year of works comes on the heels of her time as a writer and showrunner on Killing Eve, which garnered her two Emmy nominations in 2019.

 
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