Lin-Manuel Miranda to direct film adaptation of musical ‘Octet’
Lin-Manuel Miranda attends the opening night of ‘Waiting For Godot’ at the Hudson Theatre on Sept. 28, 2025, in New York City. (John Lamparski/Getty Images)
Lin-Manuel Miranda has found his next project.
The Hamilton creator will direct the film adaptation of Dave Malloy’s musical Octet.
“I haven’t stopped thinking about Octet since I saw Annie Tippe’s premiere production in November of 2019. Dave Malloy’s score is versatile, brilliant and grows more relevant with each passing year. It won’t leave me alone so here we are,” Miranda said in a press release.
According to an official synopsis, Octet “follows an octet of people struggling with digital dependency, charting their compulsions using only the analog vibrancy of their own voices.”
Miranda also took to Instagram to share the news of this upcoming film. He said he’s been working with Malloy on adapting the production to the big screen “for the past six years.”
“Now we get to make the movie,” Miranda wrote. “And what a joy to officially partner with Julie Oh, my ride-or-die in the movie business since tick, tick…Boom! Thank you to everyone on our team at 5000 Broadway for their work in making this a reality.”
Malloy is set to adapt his own musical’s book for the film’s screenplay. He will also executive produce the project.
“I am over the moon that Lin-Manuel is turning Octet into a movie! I was utterly gobsmacked by his work on tick, tick…Boom!, and feel so honored to have such a beacon of the musical theater world bring this piece into a new life,” Malloy said. “As a brilliant storyteller, fellow internet junkie, and dear friend, I know he’s going to make something amazing. And our cast is completely ridiculous.”
While the film’s cast has yet to be officially announced, Miranda teased that is on the way.
“Full cast soon …,” he wrote on his Instagram Story.
Ryan Gosling stars as Ryland Grace in ‘Project Hail Mary’ (Amazon MGM Studios)
For many movie fans, their weekend project was going to seeProject Hail Mary.
The Ryan Gosling sci-fi flick brought in $80.58 million in its opening weekend to debut at #1. According to Variety those numbers make Project Hail Mary the biggest debut of 2026 so far, and also the biggest ever opening for Amazon MGM, surpassing 2023’s Creed III, which brought in $58 million in its debut week.
Disney’s Hoppers, which has spent the last two weeks in the top spot, slipped to #2 with $18 million, followed by the Indian Hindi-language thriller Dhurandhar The Revenge at #3 with a $9.57 million debut. The horror flick Ready or Not 2: Here I Come debuted at #4 with just over $9 million.
Reminders of Him rounds at the top 5 with $8 million.
Here are the top 10 films at the box office 1. Project Hail Mary – $80.58 million 2. Hoppers – $18 million 3. Dhurandhar The Revenge – $9.57 million 4. Ready or Not 2: Here I Come – $9.1 million 5. Reminders of Him – $8 million 6. Scream 7 – $4.3 million 7. GOAT – $3.5 million 8. Undertone – $3 million 9. Wuthering Heights – $475,000 10. Avatar: Fire and Ash – $280,000
Elisabeth Moss is teaming back up with Hulu. Deadline reports The Handmaid’s Tale actress is set to star in and executive produce an upcoming series for the streaming service called Conviction. The legal drama is written by House and The Good Doctor creator David Shore. It will be based on the book by Jack Jordan. The story follows a lawyer who gets a career-making case only to be blackmailed by a mysterious stranger …
The man behind Saturday Night Live is getting his own documentary. Focus Features has announced it will release Lorne, a documentary about SNL creator Lorne Michaels. Morgan Neville is set to direct the film that will release in theaters on April 17. The documentary will feature exclusive footage and interviews from some of the show’s cast members and writers, including Tina Fey, Maya Rudolph, John Mulaney, Andy Samberg, Conan O’Brien, Chris Rock and more …
Take a bite out of the trailer for Forbidden Fruits. The movie, which IFC Films and Shudder are releasing, will make its world premiere at the 2026 SXSW Film & TV Festival. It follows a witchy femme cult that is based in the basement of a mall. Making up the star-studded cast are Lili Reinhart, Lola Tung, Victoria Pedretti, Alexandra Shipp and Emma Chamberlain …
Justin Baldoni speaks onstage at the Vital Voices 12th Annual Voices of Solidarity Awards, Dec. 9, 2024, in New York. Blake Lively attends ‘Another Simple Favor’ New York Screening, April 27, 2025, in New York. (Bryan Bedder/Getty Images | Michael Loccisano/Getty Images)
Animosity on the set of the film It Ends With Us was evident well before highly publicized lawsuits between stars Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni were filed, newly unsealed text messages show.
The messages, which are among the hundreds of documents the judge overseeing the civil claims ordered unsealed ahead of a hearing this week, show Lively and Baldoni venting to friends and colleagues during filming.
In a May 2023 text exchange between Lively and a journalist, Lively expresses her frustration with filming and says she “came home and cried” on one occasion. The actress also writes, “They’re just being creeps,” when referring to her co-star.
Texts between Baldoni and another actor show he was equally frustrated while making the movie. Baldoni, who also served as the film’s director, said in one message that Lively was threatening not to promote the movie if she was not allowed to take part in the edit.
In one message, he wrote, “She had the nuclear bomb. If she doesn’t promote the movie she can leak that I’m a bad person or that she felt unsafe with me and ‘all the stuff’ she has on me. Then she’s the victim.”
In a later text message, he wrote, “The risk to my family isn’t worth the creative integrity.”
Other unsealed documents include a text exchange between Lively and fellow actress Jenny Slate, who also appeared in the film.
Referring to Baldoni, Lively wrote, “I also saw something in him, was aware of a general vibe that I’m not into, and I pushed past it. Never again! Lesson learned.”
ABC News has reached out to Slate’s representative for comment.
Lively first filed a complaint against Baldoni with the California Civil Rights Department in December 2024, accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of It Ends with Us and accusing both Baldoni and his production company Wayfarer Studios of engaging in a “social manipulation” campaign to “destroy” Lively’s reputation.
The two filed dueling lawsuits against each other in New York in the weeks that followed, with Lively reiterating the claims made in her earlier complaint and further accusing Baldoni of retaliation, suing him for nearly $500 million in damages. Baldoni’s lawyer denied the allegations, stating at the time that they had “evidence which will show a pattern of bullying and threats to take over the movie” by Lively.
Baldoni filed a $400 million lawsuit against Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds, the couple’s publicist Leslie Sloane, and Sloane’s public relations company Vision PR alleging extortion and defamation, claiming Lively had “robbed” him of control over the film and had destroyed his reputation.
Lively’s lawyers denied the allegations and called Baldoni’s suit “another chapter in the abuser playbook.”
“This is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim,” they said in a statement at the time.
A federal judge in New York dismissed Baldoni’s suit in June of last year, formally ending the counterclaim in October after Baldoni did not refile an amended complaint. Attorney Byran Freedman said at the time, “Our clients chose not to amend their complaint to preserve appeal rights. In the meantime, we are focusing on Ms. Lively’s claims. We remain fully committed to pursuing the truth through every legal and factual avenue available and look forward to our day in court.”
Lively’s suit against Baldoni and Wayfarer Studios is ongoing.
This week’s documents were unsealed ahead of a hearing scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 22. The trial is set to begin May 18.
A member of Lively’s legal team responded to the newly unsealed documents in a statement to ABC News, writing, “In his TedTalk to promote his brand as an advocate for women, Justin Baldoni said we must ‘listen to the women’…even if what they are saying is against you.’ See how he actually reacts in the bombshell new evidence released for the first time, which includes sworn testimony and contemporaneous messages from numerous women who actually worked with him.”
The statement continued, “The newly unsealed evidence contains never-before seen testimony, messages, and evidence from numerous eyewitnesses backing the claims in Ms. Lively’s lawsuit. The evidence includes Ms. Lively’s own testimony describing the harassment she faced, as well as new evidence from numerous women describing their own disturbing experiences.”
ABC News has reached out to Baldoni’s representatives for comment.
