Not many directors have had a better fall than Jonathan Levine. The guy seems to be everywhere these days, and studios have taken note.
Levine's David Corenswet-starring "Mr. Irrelevant" was moved to a primo Christmas 2026 release after record-high test scores. Then Tom Cruise picked him to direct the "Days of Thunder" sequel, and he also has the Charlize Theron-Channing Tatum comedy "Dance Partners" waiting at Universal. And now, we can add a fourth project.
Deadline reports that Apple Original Films has greenlit for development "Sacrament," an action thriller that Levine will direct and Idris will produce, with plans to build the movie around the actor as its lead.
Enzo Mileti and Scott Wilson wrote the script. It follows two Chicago cops turned contractors who chase a runaway thief to a remote, heavily fortified township in Sacrament, Utah. The job is supposed to be routine until, of course, it isn't. They end up outnumbered and outgunned, and they have to figure out how to be better partners to survive. This sounds like a lean, mean B-movie premise.
This all comes off the back of "F1: The Movie," which made $634M worldwide, picked up multiple Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, and left Apple and Idris eager to work together again. Idris is currently shooting Bill Pohlad's Miles Davis film "Miles & Juliette."
However, the real story here is Levine. For years, he was the reliable guy behind "50/50," "Warm Bodies," "The Night Before," and "Long Shot." He made well-received movies, but he was never a name. That's changing fast.
The buzz on "Mr. Irrelevant" has been hard to ignore. According to THR, the film scored 95 out of 100 with men over 35 in its test screenings, while women over 35 gave it a rare 100 out of 100, for an overall score of 92. Numbers like that are almost unheard of, and Paramount responded by moving the $35M film to a Christmas Day wide release. It tells the tragic and true story of John Tuggle, the former New York Giants running back best known as the final pick of the 1983 NFL draft, with Michael Shannon playing legendary Giants head coach Bill Parcells. The word got loud enough that Cruise asked to see it, and he liked it so much that he hired Levine to direct his "Days of Thunder" sequel at Paramount.
Oh, and amid all these projects, Levine is also attached to "Dance Partners," which Universal won in a major bidding war last year. I don't know when he'll get to shoot that one, since he'll be busy with "Days of Thunder 2" through Q1 and Q2, but you can bet Universal won't want to wait too long, especially after the millions it dished out to land the project.
You don't see this every day: a major filmmaker, mid-release, admitting he's just not very good at his job. That’s exactly what Aaron Sorkin has done as “The Social Reckoning” dies a slow death in theaters.