EXCLUSIVE: Elizabeth Olsen (His Three Daughters) has closed a deal to join Julia Roberts in Panic Carefullya new Warner Bros. film that Sam Esmail will direct from his own script.
Described as a paranoid thriller in the vein of Esmail’s Emmy and Golden Globe winner Mr. Robotas well as The Silence of the Lambsthe film’s logline is being kept under wraps.
The project went out to assorted studios and streamers near the top of this year, with Warner Bros prevailing in a heated bidding war, in part due to its commitment to a theatrical run. Pic reunites Esmail with Roberts following Leave the World Behindtheir hugely popular apocalyptic thriller, based on the 2020 novel by Rumaan Alam, which premiered on Netflix in November 2023 and stands as the streamer’s fifth most popular English-language film of all time, with 143.4 million views.
Producers on Panic Carefully include Esmail and Chad Hamilton for Email Corp., along with Scott Stuber, Roberts, Marisa Yeres Gill, and Lisa Gillan. Kevin McCormick and Chrystal Li are overseeing the project for Warner Bros, with production to kick off in England in January.
An Emmy and Golden Globe nominee, Olsen is coming off of a starring role opposite Carrie Coon and Natasha Lyonne in His Three DaughtersNetflix’s family drama from Azazel Jacobs, which she also exec produced. Prior to that, she headlined Max’s minseries Love & Deathas axe murderer Candy Montgomery, as well as Disney+’s WandaVisionwhere she reprised her MCU role of Wanda Maximoff/The Scarlet Witch.
In September, Olsen premiered The Assessment — a sci-fi drama from Fleur Fortune, in which she stars opposite Alicia Vikander — at the Toronto Film Festival. Also coming up for her is A24’s Eternitya romantic comedy she exec produced, in which she stars opposite Miles Teller and Callum Turner.
Olsen is represented by CAA, Brillstein Entertainment Partners, and Sloane, Offer, Weber and Dern.
