Next Star Trek Movie to Have Franchise’s First Female Director

Variety is reporting that Paramount has found a director for “Star Trek 4”. S.J. Clarkson will be the first female director in the history of the long-running science-fiction franchise. Paramount had no official comment. The studio had announced in Las Vegas at CinemaCon that a fourth movie is being planned and will see the return of Chris Hemsworth, who appeared as Chris Pine’s father in the first of the J.J. Abrams “reboot” films, 2009’s “Star Trek.” Zachary Quinto, who played the character Spock is also returning. Chris Hemsworth seemed excited to be a part of the project when asked about the script, saying

“I’ve spoken to J.J. Abrams, and he has an amazing pitch on the whole thing.”

Details on the plot of “Star Trek 4” are vague at this point, but some sources are pointing to a plot point centres around time travel that will see Pine’s character reuniting with his father (Hemsworth). The screenplay was penned by J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay.  J.J. Abrams and Lindsey Weber will produce through Bad Robot Productions, and David Ellison and Dana Goldberg of Skydance Media will be executive producers. At SDCC 2016 Abrams had the following to say about the film

“It really is an amazing story. It’s really the reason we made the deal with Chris Hemsworth as soon as we could because we really wanted that story to be told, so fingers crossed.”

S.J. Clarkson is probably best known for her work in Television with shows including “Dexter,” “Bates Motel,” “Orange is the New Black,” and “Jessica Jones.” In addition, she also recently directed several episodes for Marvel’s “The Defenders.” Clarkson is repped by WME and the Curtis Brown Group.

This is actually only one of two Star Trek movies Paramount is currently planning. The other one is the R-Rated Star Trek film being helmed by legendary director Quentin Tarantino. We have even fewer details on that one, as Tarantino is currently busy with Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.