Following the news last month that Anne Hathaway will play the Grand High Witch in director Robert Zemeckis‘s new adaptation of the 1983 Roald Dahl book The Witches, comes word that fellow Oscar winner Octavia Spencer is in talks to join her on the cast. Earlier today we saw an official trailer for one of Spencer’s latest, a horror titled Ma.

In addition to Spencer joining the cast it’s also being reported that Jahzir Bruno and Codie-Lei Eastick are currently in negotiations for roles, and that Black-ish creator and writer of the upcoming Shaft and Coming to America sequels Kenya Barris will now be co-writing the screenplay with Zemeckis.

Back in June we found out that Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit director Robert Zemeckis would be directing the long-in-development new take on the Roald Dahl story The Witches. The story was previously adapted into the 1990 movie of the same name starring Anjelica Huston.

Now that adaptation has found its star. It’s being reported that Anne Hathaway has signed on to play the Grand High Witch in the movie, the same role Huston played in the ’90 version.

One of my favorite movies growing up was The Witches, the 1990 adaptation of Roald Dahl‘s 1973 book of the same name. A new adaptation of the book has been in the works for quite a while now, with Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron attached to direct at different points.

Now that new adaptation is back in business. It’s being reported that Back to the Future and Forrest Gump director Robert Zemeckis is in final negotiations to direct The Witches for Warner Brothers, with a deal expected to be made official soon.

A while back we learned that the man himself, Guillermo del Toro, would be producing an Alfonso Cuaron-directed version of Roald Dahl‘s The Witches. Now it seems that instead, del Toro will be the one directing (though he’s the busiest director on the planet already) and Cuaron will produce.

As many of you know via many nightmare-filled nights after watching it — the story was made into a film in 1990 also called The Witches and it starred Angelica Huston as the head witch. I don’t know about you, but that movie used to absolutely terrify me (the story with the little girl in the painting!), yet at the same time, I couldn’t look away or hide my eyes… I always had to be watching. In regards to that version and this new one, Cuaron shared the big news that differentiates the two.