Awkwafina To Join Nicholas Hoult And Nicolas Cage In Universal’s ‘Renfield’

Courtesy of Casi Moss

EXCLUSIVE: Awkwafina is set to join Nicholas Hoult and Nicolas Cage Universal Pictures’ Renfield, a monster movie centered on Dracula’s familiar henchman with Hoult playing the title role.

No word yet on what Awkwafina’s role would be.

The Tomorrow War director Chris McKay is on board to helm the pic, which is based on an original story outline from Robert Kirkman. Ryan Ridley wrote the script. Cage will play Dracula.

McKay’s producing partner Samantha Nisenboim will be joining the project as executive producer. The film will be produced by Skybound Entertainment’s film team including Kirkman, David Alpert, Bryan Furst and Sean Furst.

In the original Dracula novel, R.M. Renfield was an inmate at a lunatic asylum who was thought to be suffering from delusions but actually is a servant of Dracula. Plot details of the movie weren’t announced, but it’s believed to take place during the present day and is not a period piece.

Universal remains committed to creating filmmaker-driven projects based on characters from the studio’s vast monsters legacy. Instead of prescribing a mandated updating of these monster stories and making them all part of a larger scheme, the studio loosened these restrictions and open-sourced to filmmakers, who were inspired to create their own unique stories.

Golden Globe winner Awkwafina most recently was seen in Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, which made $431 million at the global box office. She next will be seen opposite Mahershala Ali in Apple’s Swan Song, as well as an untitled Netflix comedy with Sandra Oh. Her Comedy Central series Awkwafina Is Nora From Queens premiered its second season over the summer.

She is repped by UTA, Artists First and Isaac Dunham