Zach Cregger, BoulderLight, New Line Team for Sci-Fi Thriller ‘Companion’

Just days after winning a heated auction for the next feature project from Zach Cregger, New Line is quickly reteaming with the filmmaker behind last year’s surprise hit, Barbarian, for another genre project.

The Warner Bros. arm has picked up Companion, a sci-fi thriller from Drew Hancock, who wrote the script and who will also direct.

Cregger will produce the feature along with Raphael Margules and J.D. Lifshitz of BoulderLight Pictures and Vertigo’s Roy Lee. The project reunites the filmmaking team that produced, and in the case of Cregger, wrote and directed, Barbarian. And it becomes one of the first projects out of gate for BoulderLight’s freshly signed deal with New Line.

Plot details are being kept securely squared away on a screenwriting app.

And just like Cregger’s new project, Weapons, Companion is also being fast-tracked for a 2023 production start.

Sources say Companion was initially going to act as BoulderLight and Cregger’s follow-up to Barbarian before the filmmaker whipped up his Magnolia-esque horror epic, Weapons, late last year. But he so believed in Companion that he became an active producer, joining BoulderLight, which had originally developed the project. He also helped it land not just a home but a greenlit start of production and backed Hancock for what will be his directorial debut.

Hancock got his start writing and directing short films for the monthly Los Angeles-based film festival Channel 101. His writing credits include Spike TV’s Blue Mountain State, ABC’s Suburgatory and the 2018 Go90 original series My Dead Ex, which he created and executive produced.

He is repped by UTA, Range Media Partners and Hansen, Jacobson.