EXCLUSIVE: Amos Vernon and Nunzio Randazzo, the screenwriting duo behind Netflix’s recent hit rom-com People We Meet on Vacation, have been enlisted to pen the new Care Bears movie for Warner Bros.
This follows Josh Greenbaum’s attachment as director, which we scooped last June. It also comes following the duo’s sale of buzzy live-action comedy spec Blow Up the Chat to Warner Bros. in a bidding war, with Jeff Schaffer attached to direct.
Plot details for the Care Bears movie are being kept under wraps. Good Fear’s Chris Bender and Jake Weiner are producing alongside GoldDay’s Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, with rightsholder Cloudco’s Sean Gorman and Daniel Barnes exec producing. Sheila Walcott is overseeing the project for Warner Bros.
Care Bears has a unique origin story, as a franchise cultivated around greeting card characters popularized in the 1980s by American Greetings (now Cloudco Entertainment). Each bear had a distinct color and “belly badge” that symbolized their personality and duty — with names like Tenderheart Bear, Cheer Bear, and Grumpy Bear — the idea being to personify different emotions and positive traits to help children express their feelings and foster empathy.
The popularity of the cards led to the creation of a toy line, which then spurred animated TV specials and, eventually, a TV series. The original Care Bears cartoon aired from 1985 to 1988 and was followed by three theatrical films spanning the mid-to-late 1980s. Over the decades, the franchise has undergone several revivals. New iterations of the Care Bears TV series were released in the 2000s, 2010s, and most recently with Care Bears: Unlock the Magic, which launched in 2019.
The franchise remains a global commercial powerhouse, with over $10 billion in lifetime retail.
Vernon & Randazzo shared writing credit with Yulin Kuang on People We Meet on Vacation, Netflix’s adaptation of the #1 New York Times bestselling novel by Emily Henry from 3000 Pictures and Temple Hill Entertainment. Directed by Brett Haley and starring Emily Bader and Tom Blyth, the film debuted at #1 on Netflix’s Top 10 back in January and remained on the list for multiple weeks after release, accruing 40M+ views since then.
Vernon & Randazzo have also penned an adaptation of the Sega game Toejam & Earl for Amazon. They are represented by CAA and Hansen Jacobson Teller.
