It was announced last month that Radio Silence, the filmmaking group consisting of Tyler Gillett, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, and Chad Villella, would be tackling a remake of John Carpenter’s Escape From New York. As more details emerged, it became clear that the project wouldn’t be a remake, but would actually be a continuation of the original movie. Radio Silence confirmed this while speaking with Entertainment Weekly about the upcoming project.
Tyler Gillett told EW that the Escape From New York project is “not a remake,” adding that it’s “one of those properties that you can’t [remake], it’s sort of untouchable to us, and lives in its own stratosphere in terms of how important it is to us, and how much we love it. So it’ll be not unlike Scream, I think, a nod to, and a continuation of, what we love about those characters and that world.” Chad Villella added that they’re still in the “very, very early stages” of development, but are “very excited to be working with 20th Century on that. We’re developing our take, and hopefully, it will be going to script sometime in the New Year, and just really starting to lay the groundwork for that. But very early stages.“
There have been several attempts at getting an Escape From New York remake off the ground, with Leigh Whannell (The Invisible Man) being the last person to give it a shot before Radio Silence took over. The original film took place in the futuristic year of 1997 and found Manhattan having been turned into a giant maximum-security prison. When Air Force One is hijacked by terrorists, the President of the United States makes it to an escape pod which crashes in Manhattan. Desperate to recover him, the government turns to Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell). Before Radio Silence sets their sights on Escape From New York, they have Scream VI on the way. The upcoming sequel follows the four survivors of the Ghostface killings as they leave Woodsboro behind and start a fresh chapter. The first teaser trailer was released yesterday and found Ghostface starting a new murder spree in New York City. Scream VI will hit theaters on March 10, 2023.