‘When a Stranger Venmos’ Will Adapt Viral Short Story as a Horror Movie
“A Complete Stranger Sent Me 10k on Venmo — But There Was a Catch,” a 2022 viral short story written by Holly Riordan for Thought Catalog, is being turned into a horror movie. Deadline reports that Joe Russo & Chris LaMont (Hard Kill, The Inheritance) have secured the rights to the story, adapting it into […]
“A Complete Stranger Sent Me 10k on Venmo — But There Was a Catch,” a 2022 viral short story written by Holly Riordan for Thought Catalog, is being turned into a horror movie.
Deadline reports that Joe Russo & Chris LaMont (Hard Kill, The Inheritance) have secured the rights to the story, adapting it into a screenplay titled When a Stranger Venmos.
In the film, an assistant struggling to survive in Los Angeles is thrown a lifeline when a complete stranger offers her increasingly large sums of money to do stranger and stranger challenges. She must then decide just how far she’s willing to go to pay her bills.
Music video directors Frank Borin & Ivanna Borin — whose collective credits include 5 Seconds of Summer, Zayn, Paramore, Bring Me the Horizon, and Bon Jovi — are attached to make their feature debut on the project.
Matt Smith and Dan Gedman will produce under their Highway 10 banner.
“We’ve been obsessed with When a Stranger Venmos from the moment we read it,” said Frank and Ivanna Borin. “We were pulled in by how this horror thriller takes the anxiety of modern-day survival in today’s America and turns it into something sharp, fast, and terrifying. It’s the kind of story that speaks directly to what young people are feeling right now and that’s the secret weapon of the genre.”
Smith and Gedman added, “Russo and LaMont’s fast-paced thriller immediately excited us with its compelling mystery, franchisable villain, and most importantly the culturally relevant questions it was asking of what Gen Z is both forced and willing to do to get ahead in the modern world. We have long wanted to work with Frank and Ivanna Borin. Their style, sensibility and connectivity to youth culture make them the perfect directors for this project.”
Not to be confused with the Avengers filmmaker of the same name, Joe Russo recently co-wrote the religious horror film Portrait of God, which is set to be produced by Jordan Peele and Sam Raimi for Universal.
Russo is also known in the genre space for producing the award-winning podcast Post Mortem with Mick Garris and the horror anthology Nightmare Cinema.
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