Bryce Dallas Howard Turns Screenwriter

Plus the nepotism train gets started early in the Howard family

By: Brad Brevet
Published: Tuesday, June 9th 2009 at 10:23 AM

I think there is still a lot more to be seen from Bryce Dallas Howard, the daughter of director Ron Howard, and the completely ignored co-star of Terminator Salvation. Howard has already started showing a different side of herself as The Hollywood Reporter reveals she co-wrote a new script titled The Originals with Dane Charbeneau and Universal and Imagine Entertainment have already stepped in to pick it up as a potential feature for Ron Howard to direct.

The script is described as an ensemble feature about a group of twentysomethings who reconvene for a weekend in New York after learning the teacher who shaped their childhoods has fallen into a mysterious coma. Apparently Dallas Howard came up with the idea over the past couple of years looking at it as a way of tackling the quarter-life crisis issues her contemporaries were dealing with. Howard and Charbeneau have been working on it for the past two years and in the process Charbeneau began dating Howard's sister Jocelyn. The two are now are engaged.

The film is still in development and not likely to become Ron Howard's next feature, but THR does bring up the possibility of Howard still directing a remake of the 1970 sci-fi saga Colossus: The Forbin Project. Howard was first attached to the feature back in April of 2007 with Jason Rothenberg set to pen the screenplay.

Colossus is based on a book by D.F. Jones, which tells the story of a brainiac who designs a supercomputer for the government as a means of protection, and the computer decides itself that the most effective way it can act as protector is to assume complete control. Of course this isn't a new idea as I remember watching The Invisible Boy (1957) as it told a very similar story. Perhaps Howard will bring Robby the Robot into the mix as well.