The Wolf Man (franchise)

The Wolf Man is a horror film series centered on Larry Talbot, a man who upon being bitten by a werewolf becomes one himself, and his subsequent attempts to cure himself of his murderous condition. The film series was created by Curt Siodmak.
The original series of films consisted of five installments, all of which starred iconic horror actor Lon Chaney Jr. as Larry Talbot. The series of films is part of the larger Universal Classic Monsters series.
In March 2006, Universal Pictures announced the remake of The Wolf Man with Puerto Rican actor Benicio del Toro, a huge fan of the original and collector of Wolf Man memorabilia, in the lead role, who was "cast for his resemblance to Lon Chaney Jr., with his clouded, thick features and his air of suffering". Lawrence is depicted as an "Anglo-Indian, which explains his complexion, and the film notes that he was educated in America, to explain his accent". Screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker was attached to the screenplay, developing the original film's story to include additional characters as well as plot points that would take advantage of modern visual effects. Del Toro also looked towards Werewolf of London and The Curse of the Werewolf for inspiration.
In February 2007, director Mark Romanek was attached to helm The Wolfman. Romanek's original vision was to "infuse a balance of cinema in a popcorn movie scenario": "When there’s a certain amount of money involved, these things make studios and producers a little nervous. They don’t necessarily understand it or they feel that the balance will swing too far to something esoteric, and we could never come to an agreement on the right balance for that type of thing. Ultimately it made more sense for them to find a director that was gonna fulfill their idea of the film that they wanted, and we just sort of parted ways". In January 2008, Romanek left the project because of creative differences. Brett Ratner emerged as a frontrunner to replace Romanek, but the studio also met with Frank Darabont, James Mangold and Joe Johnston. They were also interested in Bill Condon, and Martin Campbell was interested. Johnston was hired to direct on in February, and the film's shooting schedule and budget remained as intended. Johnston hired David Self to rewrite the script.
Following the financial and critical disappointment of the 2010 remake, Universal Pictures announced its plan to reboot the Universal Classic Monsters in July 2014 as part of a shared universe known as the Dark Universe. In November 2014, Aaron Guzikowski was confirmed to be writing the reboot of Universal's The Wolf Man (1941). In June 2016, Deadline Hollywood reported on rumors that Universal wanted to cast Dwayne Johnson in the title role. By October, development on the film began moving forward, and David Callaham was hired to rewrite the screenplay. In 2017, The Mummy was released as the first film in the Dark Universe; its launch was both a critical and commercial failure, and resulted in Universal deciding to shift its focus on individual storytelling and move away from the shared universe concept with the cancelation of The Wolf Man and other films in development.
Following the success of Leigh Whannell's The Invisible Man in 2020, Universal Pictures "scrap[ped] the universe concept" and loosened restrictions for the talent in front and behind the camera, allowing them to decide how they wanted to execute their films and inviting "big name talent" to pitch their ideas. By early 2020, Universal had been hearing project ideas for a year and a half from a variety of filmmakers seeking to develop other characters in the franchise. This included Ryan Gosling's pitch to remake The Wolf Man, in the vein of Nightcrawler, with Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo writing the screenplay. Several filmmakers were considered to direct, including Cory Finley and Whannell, who initially demurred and was advised by producer Jason Blum to reconsider. In July, Whannell entered negotiations to both write a film treatment and direct. Derek Cianfrance briefly took over directing and writing responsibilities in October 2021, before both Gosling and Cianfrance were reported to have exited the project in December 2023. Whannell returned to direct, along with writing the screenplay alongside Corbett Tuck, Schuker Blum, and Angelo. Christopher Abbott was also announced to be replacing Gosling in the lead role.