Dust off your chokers and recommission your plaid miniskirts: The Craft’s long-awaited reboot is finally happening. Seriously, it’s been in the works forever — we wrote about it back in 2015.
But if there was ever a revamp worth waiting for it’s this one. The 1996 original is rightfully an outsider teen classic, and any remake needs to be done right. The film already has one big win in the bag: the casting of a stellar coven. In the lead role as newcomer Hannah is new-ish actress Cailee Spaeny (who played RBG’s daughter in On The Basis of Sex and starred as a coke-huffing party monster in an All-American Rejects video). Hannah’s a high school outcast who starts experimenting with witchcraft with three new friends — magical and sinister consequences ensue.
Her fellow witches will be played by Gideon Adlon, who was wonderful as a high school lesbian coming into her own in Blockers, Lovie Simone (who’s big on Insta, and had a minor OITNB role), and Zoey Luna, a trans actress who had a small part as Lacey on Pose.
While it shouldn’t be newsworthy in the year of our lord 2019, the fact remains that casting a trans actress as one of the central roles is a big deal. There’s no word on the specifics of Luna’s role, but it would be especially cool if her character is trans, too. Trans characters in horror have historically been written as two-dimensional and troubled. As Jenni Holtz writes in an essay for 14 East, “Trans women in horror are presented as abject beings — or anything that is considered gross because it is outside of the self.” If this future teen classic bucks that damaging trope, then it would be a huge step forward against an archaic film stereotype.
On board to direct the new movie is Zoe Lister-Jones, who previously directed and starred in the well-received dark comedy Band Aid. Producer Douglas Wick has said that the new film isn’t a remake but a sequel, exploring how a new generation of young women discover this magic.
That’s enough for us to feel cautiously optimistic. Especially seeing as original director Andrew Fleming is attached as executive producer. But if it sucks? The 1996 original has a hex for that. Start practicing: light as a feather, stiff as a board.