Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

Birds of Prey director Cathy Yan is working on a new SF comedy, The Freshening,.

Variety broke the news that Yan will adapt and direct Rachel Khong’s short story, which appeared in the Paris Review in 2018.

The official description is:

“Khong’s short story is set in a near future where tensions over race and gender have reached a violent extreme, the U.S. government institutes a public health initiative known as ‘The Freshening’: every American receives an injection, after which everyone only sees others as the same race and gender as themselves. But when a street drug hits the scene, promising a chance to see the world as it really is, will she choose to disrupt this ‘freshened’ world?”

“When we read ’The Freshening’ we were blown away by this timely and provocative story. Developing this film with Cathy and all of our fantastic partners is going to be a one-of-a-kind experience in filmmaking,” producers FilmNation Entertainment’s President, Film & Television Production Ben Browning and SVP of Production Ashley Fox explained.

“’The Freshening’ is exactly the type of daring and timely film that excites me as a writer and director, and that Ash and I started Rewild to produce,” said Yan. “I’m delighted to get to work with like-minded collaborators Ali Wong, Hyperobject and FilmNation to bring this bold and impactful story to the screen.””

“I was so haunted by Rachel Khong’s compelling and high concept story when I read it,” said Wong. “‘The Freshening’ is unlike anything I’ve ever worked on and I’m thrilled to develop it into a film with everyone involved. From the beginning, it was my dream for Cathy Yan to write and direct this project and I’m so incredibly grateful it came true.”

“We fell in love with Cathy when we met her and we’re thrilled she’s bringing her singular perspective to this wild, genre-bending material,” said Hyperobject Industries’ Betsy Koch.