Last Week Tonight host John Oliver has joined the cast of The Lion King, Disney’s live-action remake of their animated classic of the same name.

Oliver will voice the role of Zazu, the uptight bird who acts as an advisor to Mufasa. The character was voiced by Rowan Atkinson, better known by some as Mr. Bean, in the original animated movie.

The Beguiled
Director: Sofia Coppola
Screenwriter: Sofia Coppola
Cast: Nicole Kidman, Kirsten Dunst, Elle Fanning, Colin Farrell
Distributor: Focus Features
Rated R | 94 Minutes
Release Date: June 23, 2017

Sofia Coppola‘s first short film, 1998’s Lick the Star, follows a clique of teenage girls led by Chloe, who is obsessed with V.C. Andrews’ novel, Flowers in the Attic. Chloe orchestrates a plan with her girl gang to “weaken” the boys they don’t like at their school by poisoning their lunches with arsenic. The 14-minute black and white 16mm short film shows early signs of Coppola’s fascination with the themes of isolation and identity, sexual awakening, and the trauma of adolescence.

Since then, Coppola has explored these ideas in the 18th, 20th, and 21st centuries with Marie Antoinette, The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation, Somewhere, and The Bling Ring. Now, the writer-director journeys to the 19th century with The Beguiled, a remake of the 1971 film of the same name, based on the 1966 Southern Gothic novel, A Painted Devil, by Thomas P. Cullinan.

The Mummy (2017)
Director: Alex Kurtzman
Writers: David Koepp, Christopher McQuarrie, Dylan Kussman
Cast: Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Annabelle Wallis, Jake Johnson, Courtney B. Vance, Russell Crowe
Distributor: Universal Pictures
Rated PG-13 | 107 Minutes
Release Date: June 9, 2017

“Welcome to a new world of gods and monsters.”

If you’re a moviegoer in the year 2017, odds are you’re familiar with the concept of a “shared cinematic universe.” Whether it’s the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s The Avengers or the DC Extended Universe’s upcoming Justice League, we understand that these franchises are built on standalone stories set within the same continuity, leading to crossover events and team-up films.

The idea of a shared cinematic universe came into being over 70 years ago with the emergence of Universal Monsters. Following their popular silent films, 1923’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame and 1925’s The Phantom of the Opera, Universal Studios began developing talkies based on other classic horror characters. 1931’s Dracula and Frankenstein got things started, followed by The Mummy (1932), The Invisible Man (1933), 1935’s Bride of Frankenstein, and The Wolf Man (1941).

This weekend, Universal will launch the start of their brand new Dark Universe monsters franchise with a reboot of The Mummy. Directed by Alex Kurtzman, the film will bring together some of our favorite classic monsters in an all new shared universe involving Universal Monsters. It will be followed up by the Bill Condon-directed Bride of Frankenstein, starring Javier Bardem; Creature of the Black Lagoon from screenwriters Jeff Pinkner and Will Beall; The Invisible Man, starring Johnny Depp; and Van Helsing, from Prometheus scribe Jon Spaihts, Arrival writer Eric Heisserer, and Dan Mazeau.

But that is just the beginning. Because Kurtzman says there are more Dark Universe films on the way. In a new interview, the man responsible for building this new Universal Monsters shared universe says Dracula, Frankenstein, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and The Phantom of the Opera are being developed. More on the story below.

As Disney continues to mine through their animation vault, more and more acclaimed directors are climbing aboard live-action adaptations. Sam Mendes (Spectre, American Beauty) is the latest filmmaker to join the club. According to new reports, Mendes is in talks to direct a live-action remake of Pinocchio – not to be confused with the Pinocchio starring Robert Downey Jr. that is being developed at Warner Bros – the 1940 classic film about an elderly, impoverished woodcarver named Gepetto, who creates Pinocchio and wishes upon a star that he could be a real boy.

More on the story below.