Ethan Coen plotting solo directorial effort for Focus & Working Title

Hot on the heels of Joel Coen’s success helming The Tragedy of Macbeth for Apple TV Plus comes news that the other Coen Brother, Ethan Coen, is plotting his own solo directorial effort. According to THR, the film is set up with Focus Features and Working Title and is based on a script Coen wrote with his wife, Tricia Cooke. As per THR, it’s supposedly “a lesbian road trip project that Coen and Cooke initially wrote in the mid-2000s.”

Before you think that all sounds a little too serious, THR goes on to reveal that the project is a “story centered on a party girl who takes a trip from Philadelphia to Miami with her buttoned-down friend. Cruising bars ensues as does the potpourri of a severed head in a hatbox, a bitter ex-girlfriend, a mystery briefcase and an evil senator.” Mysterious briefcases and severed heads? Now THAT sounds like a movie fit for a Coen Brother!

Initially, the film Coen is now planning to direct himself was set for another director (Gas Food Lodging’s Allison Anders), but the project, which was supposed to be a fun throwback to 1970’s style exploitation flicks, fell apart over the years. It sounds a lot less highbrow than Joel’s 1:33:1 black and white Shakespeare adaption, although The Tragedy of Macbeth was damn good.

While I’m sorry that the Coen Bros have split up, hopefully, it’s not a long-term thing as they indeed are the greatest directorial duo in film history. Asked whether the split was permanent, Joel Coen told The Guardian last year, “When we started working together, we never asked ourselves if this was permanent, and we don’t think about this in that way, either. We just thought we should do some different things for a while. But I could get hit by a bus tomorrow. I’m in my late 60s. Hopefully, I can do this for a while – but who the f*** knows?” Their longtime composer Carter Burwell mentioned earlier that Ethan was giving movies a rest, but it seems now like that rest is over.

The Tragedy of Macbeth is streaming now on Apple TV Plus.