{"id":703715,"date":"2026-05-30T05:58:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T05:58:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/703715\/"},"modified":"2026-05-30T05:58:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T05:58:14","slug":"terrifiers-damien-leone-heads-to-lionsgate-for-next-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/703715\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Terrifier’s’ Damien Leone Heads to Lionsgate for Next Film"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the bigger indie horror success stories<\/a> in recent years is going to a major studio. Damien Leone<\/a>, the director behind the box office darling \u201cTerrifier<\/a>\u201d franchise, will make his next film<\/a> at Lionsgate<\/a> and is teaming with horror legend Sam Raimi<\/a> to make it. <\/p>\n

But rather than Lionsgate picking up the franchise or the next \u201cTerrifier\u201d film, it will be an original project called \u201cTortures of the Damned,\u201d which Leone is writing, directing, and producing. Plot details are being kept under wraps.<\/p>\n

\u201cTortures of the Damned\u201d will be Leone\u2019s next project after he completes \u201cTerrifier 4,\u201d which is currently in pre-production. <\/p>\n

The \u201cTerrifier\u201d franchise follows the murderous Art the Clown in a series of ultra gory slasher films rife with sexual violence. The films are so gruesome that they\u2019ve been released unrated by the MPA, so it\u2019s a surprise that a major studio that needs to play by those rules would embrace the director\u2019s next project.<\/p>\n

\"'Backrooms,'<\/a> \"PARK<\/a> <\/p>\n

But the box office is hard to ignore. The first \u201cTerrifier\u201d from 2016 made little impact at all, but the franchise became a cult smash when the second film opened from Cineverse in 2022, doing so with a very minimal marketing budget<\/a>, and wound up grossing $15.8 million worldwide. The third film from 2024 blew the doors off and made $90 million worldwide. <\/p>\n

Leone spoke to IndieWire back in October 2024 in response to accusations that his films were misogynistic in their depictions of violence against women. He\u2019s defended himself against those accusations<\/a> by pointing to the love fans have for the franchise\u2019s final girl Sienna Shaw, as played by Lauren LaVera.\u201d IndieWire also reported<\/a> on a recent breach of contract suit filed against Leone by some of the franchise\u2019s actresses as well as other disputes between artists who claim to have worked on the film or its promotional materials.<\/p>\n

Raimi and Rob Tapert will produce through their Ghost House label alongside Leone. Scott O\u2019Brien and Pavan Kalidindi will oversee for Lionsgate. Romel Adam and Jose Ca\u00f1as will oversee the project for Ghost House and executive produce. The deals were negotiated for the studio by Dan Freedman.<\/p>\n

Erin Westerman, president, Lionsgate Motion Picture Group, said in a statement, \u201cWe\u2019re incredibly proud and excited to be partnering with Damien Leone on his first original film after the beloved \u2018Terrifier\u2019 series. I join the huge contingency of horror fans \u2014 and Damien fans \u2014 inside Lionsgate who have been following his work and cheering him on. Damien is a true genre auteur with a singular vision, and we\u2019re thrilled to help bring this bold new project to the screen while continuing to build on the incredible connection he has with fans around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leone is represented by WME and Zerner Law. <\/p>\n

Raimi most recently directed the horror thriller \u201cSend Help,\u201d and he\u2019s teaming with Lionsgate again on another horror remake of the film \u201cMagic.\u201d He is represented by CAA and Hansen, Jacobson, Teller.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the bigger indie horror success stories in recent years is going to a major studio. Damien…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703716,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[64,63,98586,134,1689,18030,344,80005,43175],"class_list":["post-703715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-damien-leone","tag-entertainment","tag-film","tag-lionsgate","tag-movies","tag-sam-raimi","tag-terrifier"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703715\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}