Tom Hanks and his Playtone partner, Gary Goetzman have signed an multi-year exclusive overall deal with Apple TV+. One of the first projects the production company founders are working on with the streaming service is the sequel to their hit 2020 war movie, Greyhound, Deadline is reporting.
The first film starred and was written by Hanks, who based the script on the 1955 novel, The Good Shepherd by C. S. Forester. The movie quickly became one of Apple TV+’s most watched productions after it was first released two summers ago.
No other major details about the Greyhound sequel have been released yet, including whether Hanks will reprise his role, or if the original film’s director, Aaron Schneider, will return to the franchise to helm the follow-up. Apple Studios will be returning to the series to produce its next installment.
Greyhound was one of the streaming service’s first tentpole features after Apple acquired it for release from Sony Pictures amid the pandemic. Hanks played Captain Krause, an inexperienced US Navy commander who’s trying to outrun and evade a pack of German submarines, in the movie, which was nominated for the Best Sound Academy Award last year.
In addition to the Greyhound sequel, as part of the exclusive deal, Apple Studios will develop, produce and globally distribute Playtone projects. Besides feature films, the deal will include scripted series, documentaries and other unscripted properties.
Besides working onthe Greyhound follow-up, Playtone just wrapped production on the television show, Masters of the Air, for Apple TV+, with Apple Studios and Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Television. The series will star Elvis actor Austin Butler in the lead role of Gale Cleven, an Allied pilot during World War II.
Under leadership of Jamie Erlicht and Zack Van Amburg, Apple+ has garnered continuous growing success in recent months. Its coming-of-age movie, CODA, won the Best Picture Oscar last month, which marks the first time a streaming service project won in the category.