Will Poulter will play the evil clown Pennywise in Cary Fukunaga's remake of It. The film will be split into two feature films though will reportedly stay true to Stephen King's original story while giving the terrifying tale a new aesthetic.

Will PoulterWIll Poulter will play the evil clown Pennywise in Cary Fukunaga's It remake

The original It followed a group of outcast kids who come together over summer break to take on a monster disguised as a clown who's haunting the town. The popular book was made into a TV miniseries in 1991 starring John Ritter and Tim Curry - the latter famously playing the evil clown. A movie adaptation was never made given the size of King's novel - hence Fukunaga's decision to split his film into two.

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The True Detective director has penned the screenplay along with Chase Palmer, Seth Grahame-Smith and David Katzenberg, while Niija Kuykendall, Dave Neustadter and Walter Hamada overseeing for Warner Bros and New Line. Production will begin this summer.

Interestingly, Fukunaga considered the likes of Mark Rylance and Ben Mendelsohn for Pennywise, though New Line was keen to take the move in a different direction. Sources tell Variety that the director could not say no after being "blown away" by Poulter's audition for the part.

Though still probably best known for the comedy hit We're the Millers, Poulter has been flexing his acting chops in recent years and will star opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu's The Revenant. 

Given Stephen King's It runs to about 900 pages, the plan is to have the first movie focusing on the protagonists as kids, and another as adults. Fukunaga already has both scripts ready to go. 

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