The Secret Life Of Houdini Closes In On Dan Trachtenberg As A Director

After his highly successful (both at the box office as well as with critics) 10 Cloverfield Lane, director Dan Trachtenberg had thus far effectively vanished from the feature film scene. Now Deadline’s Mike Fleming has learned that Trachtenberg is now in talks to helm The Secret Life of Houdini, based on the book (similarly named, The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America’s First Superhero) by William Kalush and Larry Sloman.

The book’s angle on the famous magician is as a secret agent investigating the occult. The screenplay is by Noah Oppenheim, who like Trachtenberg is new to the scene as a writer with only three feature film credits. His latest, the Jackie biopic, is being hailed as a strong uptick as far as critical acclaim goes (currently standing at a 93 Metacritic score). Hopefully this combination of new blood on the script and direction side along with the experienced production duo of Frank Marshall (yea, the same fellow who’s produced such classics as Raiders of the Lost Ark, Back to the Future, and Sixth Sense) and Bruce Cohen (Big Fish, American Beauty) will let this film succeed where so many prior Houdini story attempts have been lackluster at best (the most recent having been another of Fox’s one season wonders, Houdini & Doyle).