News

Golly! Hugh Grant is playing a psycho in a new A24 horror movie

‘Heretic’ sees the ‘Paddington 2’ star playing a different kind of villain

Phil de Semlyen
Written by
Phil de Semlyen
Global film editor
The Undoing
Photograph: HBOHugh Grant in ‘The Undoing’
Advertising

Anyone who’s been enjoying Hugh Grant’s recent rich run of big-screen villains as much as us will be excited by news that he’s in talks to star in a new horror movie from A24.

That film is Heretic and will follow in a line of A24 horrors that includes Hereditary and Midsommar. Plot details are thin on the ground but it’s rumoured to feature two female Mormon missionaries whose attempts to convert an eccentric man develop into a deadly game of pursuit and evasion.

Presumably, Grant will be playing the film’s villain (unless he’s rocking up in Phoenix Buchanan’s nun costume from Paddington 2), which would represent an intriguing move into full-blown horror for the one-time romcom stalwart.  

Co-starring with the Brit is Chloe East, according to Deadline. The actress played Sammy Fabelman’s girlfriend in The Fabelmans and will be playing one of the unfortunate evangelists in the film.

Heretic is written and will be directed by rising genre double-act Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, the screenwriters behind A Quiet Place and recent Stephen King adaptation The Boogeyman.

Also ahead for Grant stans is the enticing prospect of a role as an Oompa-Loompa for Paddington 2 director Paul King in Wonka.

He’s also starring in Netflix movie Unfrosted, a directorial debut for Jerry Seinfeld based on the invention of the Pop-Tart that co-stars Melissa McCarthy and Amy Schumer. 

How Hugh Grant became Hollywood’s ultimate on-screen villain.

From Michael Caine to Olivia Colman: 50 Great British actors.

You may also like
You may also like
Advertising