Search form

Scroll To Top
Film

Hail Manon! The Craft Remake Just Announced Its Cast

Hail Manon! The Craft Remake Just Announced Its Cast

Zoey Luna, Gideon Adlon, Lovie Simone and Cailee Spaeney

These are the weirdos, mister.

We've finally met the coven, and we can't wait to join.

Blumhouse's The Craft remake just announced its new cast of witches, and it's got us dancing naked in the moonlight! Deadline reports that Gideon Adlon (The Society), Lovie Simone (Orange Is the New Black), and Zoey Luna (Pose) are joining the cast, along with the previously announced Cailee Spaeny (On the Basis of Sex).

Those of us who are obsessed with the 1996 original -- which stars Robin Tunney, Fairuza Balk, Neve Campbell, and Rachel True as a group of teenage outcasts who form a coven in order to get back at their bullies and live their dream lives before it all comes crashing down on them -- have long said that the only way they could make the movie better is if it had more witches of color and it was queer. Thank Manon, our dark prayers have been answered.

Adlon, daughter of Better Things creator Pamela Adlon, broke onto the scene last year in the Kay Cannon-directed comedy Blockers, playing lesbian teenager Sam. In addition to playing Ruth Bader Ginsburg's daughter in the biopic On the Basis of Sex, Spaeny has been featured in such movies as Bad Times at the El Royale and Vice. Simone stars in the OWN drama series Greenleaf and the Sundance hit Selah & the Spades.

Zoey Luna is an especially game-changing addition to the cast. The actress and trans activist -- who starred in the HBO documentary 15: A Quinceanera Story -- will be playing a trans Latina witch.

A casting call shared by GLAAD this summer said the film was looking for a trans actress to play Lourdes, a "punk rocker" whose "super-Catholic mother threw her out for being trans." According to the release, the character "now lives with her 80-year-old abuela, who has taught Lourdes a variety of supernatural practices." Maybe the Bony Lady -- Santa Muerte herself -- will make an appearance?

Witchcraft and the queerness have always been intertwined -- both witches and LGBTQ+ people are ostracized and persecuted for existing outside the patriarchy. In recent years, queer and trans people who seek to gain strength from that outsider status have fully embraced that relationship -- buying crystals, starting their own covens, and finding their identities in traditions their queer ancestors practiced.

TL;DR version: If you know three queer women under the age of 35, you probably know at least one witch.

It's especially cool that we'll get to see a trans Latina witch learning the craft from her abuela. Brujeria (Spanish for witchcraft) is an important part of Latinx culture for a lot of people, which is usually depicted in a negative light in movies like Sicario and pretty much any film where Mexican cartels are the bad guys. This time, Lourdes will be using that same power to fight transphobes and high school mean girls. Good for you, Lourdes!

The Craft is being produced by horror master Jason Blum, along with Douglas Wick, who produced the '90s version, and Lucy Fisher. Zoe Lister-Jones will write and direct, as well as serving as an executive producer, alongside Andrew Fleming, the original film's director and co-writer.

RELATED | The Craft Reboot is Coming Whether You Want It Or Not

30 Years of Out100Out / Advocate Magazine - Jonathan Groff and Wayne Brady

From our Sponsors

Most Popular

Latest Stories

Mey Rude

Mey Rude is a journalist and cultural critic who has been covering queer news for a decade. The transgender, Latina lesbian lives in Los Angeles with her fiancée.

Mey Rude is a journalist and cultural critic who has been covering queer news for a decade. The transgender, Latina lesbian lives in Los Angeles with her fiancée.