The Exorcist: William Friedkin will not be involved with sequel trilogy from David Gordon Green

Blumhouse Productions and David Gordon Green just wrapped up their trilogy of Halloween sequels, and now they’re moving on to making a trilogy of sequels to the 1973 classic The Exorcist (watch it HERE). And while their approach to The Exorcist seems similar to the approach they took to Halloween – it’s another sequel trilogy, and they’ve brought back the star of the original film (Ellen Burstyn in this case) – it’s not going to be a total repeat. They got original Halloween director John Carpenter to come on board their Halloween movies as a producer and composer, but they have not sought out the advice of original The Exorcist director William Friedkin.

Movie Maker‘s Joshua Encinias asked Green, “Will William Friedkin have a role in your new Exorcist trilogy like John Carpenter did in the Halloween trilogy?” Green replied, “He won’t. On this journey, we picked Ellen Burstyn to be our spiritual guru. Our Exorcist is linked narratively by its characters, but it isn’t in terms of stylistic parallels. I’m not leaning into what Friedkin did, but it is going deep into who Chris MacNeil is and what she brought to the table. Without giving away too much, the tools and insights that she’s utilized over fifity years find a new application. Ellen’s the one we’ve brought on board, and we filmed eight days with her a year ago to do some technical and creative explorations, and next week we get back in the ring. So to answer your question, Friedkin’s not involved in this. If he’s as good as John Carpenter at making music we’ll get him to do a song in the movie. He can do a trombone version of “Tubular Bells.”“

That answer seems overly dismissive, but even if Blumhouse and Green did ask Friedkin to be involved with their Exorcist movies it’s likely he would turn them down. Friedkin has admitted that he has never watched any of the Exorcist sequels, not even Exorcist III, which was written and directed by his friend / Exorcist author and screenwriter William Peter Blatty (who passed away in 2017).

Universal and Peacock paid an amount somewhere in the range of $400 million to acquire the rights to distribute this new Exorcist trilogy. Coming to us from Blumhouse Productions and Morgan Creek Entertainment, the films are being produced by Jason Blum, David Robinson, and James Robinson. Green, Danny McBride, and Couper Samuelson serve as executive producers. Ryan Turek is overseeing the project for Blumhouse.

Green crafted the story for The Exorcist 2023 with Peter Sattler (Broken Diamonds), then wrote the screenplay with McBride (who wrote all three of the new Halloweens with him) and their Halloween Kills co-writer Scott Teems.

As mentioned, original Exorcist star Ellen Burstyn reprises the role of Chris MacNeil in the film. She said that she already shot her scenes a long time ago, so it was good to get clarification on that in the new quote from Green. Burstyn is joined in the cast by Leslie Odom Jr. (Hamilton) and Ann Dowd (The Handmaid’s Tale). Details are being kept under wraps, but we do know that Odom is playing a character who 

tracks down Chris MacNeil after his child becomes possessed.

Green’s The Exorcist is scheduled to be released on October 13, 2023. Are you looking forward to seeing what he does with the franchise William Friedkin and William Peter Blatty started decades ago? Share your thoughts on this one by leaving a comment below.