Octavia Spencer has been following true crime stories since she was just 11 years old.

Speaking at Deadline’s Contenders: The Nominees Studio, Spencer said, “I think there are a lot of people who are very new to the true crime genre. I’m not, I’ve been studying it. I read a horrible story, a true crime story, when I was 11 and I think it made an indelible mark on me.”

Spencer is Emmy-nominated for narrating the true crime Lost Women docuseries, which gives voice to murdered and disregarded women. She was previously Emmy-nominated for Lost Women of Highway 20 and now, with Lost Women of Alaska, the producer and narrator tells the story of a series of brutal, underreported crimes against indigenous women in Alaska.

Watch the Contenders conversation below, and scroll down for more photos from the event.

“We had a brilliant filmmaker in Christina Douglas,” Spencer said, “so I chose to not view the footage as it was being assembled. And I waited until everything was assembled and it was easier then, because the stories were so haunting, but they were also very empowering. So, I was able to imbue the narrative with what I felt that was being portrayed on screen.”

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Spencer had founded production company Orit Entertainment in 2019. She said, “I thought it was the right time for Orit to explore these stories and to try to offer closure. And ‘closure’ is such a strange word, because when you lose a loved one so violently, when you lose a loved one and you don’t have any idea what happened to them, I doubt that you can get closure. But at least to resolve what happened to some of these women, I felt it was incumbent upon me as a citizen of the world to be a part of that, having that access and allowing the families to have access to resources. And Lost Women of Highway 20 and now of Alaska is a small means to do so.”

Spencer says filmmaker Douglas wanted to very much focus mostly on the women rather than talking about the criminals. “Christina Douglas, our director who also happens to be a woman of indigenous descent, suggested, and we also agree, that maybe we focus on the narrative and not name the criminal as much, but say the names of the women as many times as possible and showcase the family members who were coming forward, and re-engage the narrative to be about the women whose voices were stolen.”

In working through the material and preparing to literally give voice to the women with her narration, Spencer said, “I still feel rage because these women were still being targeted and there was a suspect right out there in the open. When we look at Alaska, this man left his home country because he knew that he could go to Alaska and do all of these criminal acts and have less visibility. Think about that. We go on vacation to get away and to think that someone targeted a specific community to commit crimes, and then it was actually bolstered by the fact that the police did not investigate… There were over 1300 missing women from the indigenous community and very little law enforcement help. There were systemic failures, not only with police department, but within a society that would even allow this to happen.”

Spencer hinted that her next installment of the Lost Women series might look at Hollywood. “I don’t know if that’s happening, but we’ll see,” she said. “Sadly, there are so many places that we could go, so many women who’ve been harmed.”

Johnny Depp is in talks to return to the “Pirates of the Caribbean” series, according to franchise producer Jerry Bruckheimer.

Speaking in a carpet interview with Deadline Hollywood at Disney’s annual expo D23, Bruckheimer offered an update on the long-burgeoning sixth entry in the “Pirates” series, floating that the production is working on bringing Depp back.

“We’re talking to Johnny. We’re working on a screenplay. Hopefully we can get this done,” Bruckheimer said.

Representatives for Depp, Bruckheimer and Disney did not respond to a request for comment.

A reunion would return Depp to one of his most iconic roles. The original “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” was credited with revitalizing the star’s career when it released in 2003, solidifying him as a blockbuster marquee draw and even earning him an Oscar nomination for best actor. He has since led four sequels.

While the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise has been on ice since its fifth entry, “Dead Men Tell No Tales,” opened in 2017, there has been a series of public updates regarding the development of the next installment. “Deadpool” writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick were initially hired for a follow-up before Craig Mazin and Ted Elliott were reported to have taken over duties. In September 2025, Bruckheimer confirmed to TheWrap that reports of Margot Robbie circling the project were true and stated that producers had developed two scripts at one point.

Running parallel to those years of development, Depp has both exited and re-entered the Hollywood mainstream after a series of legal troubles. In 2022, Depp was favored by a jury in a defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife Amber Heard, which claimed that a 2018 op-ed she had written accused Depp of sexual violence and domestic abuse, ruining his career. Both Heard and Depp appealed their respective verdicts in the 2022 trial before reaching a settlement.

During the trial, Depp testified about a Daily Mail article in 2018 that reported he was “out as Jack Sparrow,” stating that “I wasn’t aware of that, but it doesn’t surprise me. Two years had gone by of constant worldwide talk about me being this wife beater. So I’m sure that Disney was trying to cut ties to be safe.” In 2020, Depp exited Warner Bros.’ “Fantastic Beasts” franchise after losing a libel case against The Sun, which had reported him to be a “wife beater.”

Since the trial, Depp has mounted a return to Hollywood productions. He is leading Paramount’s “Ebenezer,” a high-budget take on “A Christmas Carol” slated to open in November, as well as Lionsgate’s coming 2027 thriller “Day Drinker.” He promoted “Ebenezer” through an in-character appearance at San Diego Comic-Con in July.

Back in 2022, amidst Depp’s lawsuit against Heard, Bruckheimer was asked by The Sunday Times if the “Pirates” star could potentially return to the franchise. “Not at this point,” he answered, before adding that “the future is yet to be decided.”

Following his transformation for The Smashing Machine, Dwayne Johnson is back together with Benny Safdie for their next project.

While speaking to Deadline on Sunday at D23, the Golden Globe nominee revealed that he’s begun production on the Safdie-helmed Lizard Music, for which he undergoes “five hours of makeup every day” to play a man in his 70s.

“We’re in full production. It’s called Lizard Music, I’m with Benny Safdie again. That’s my guy,” he said. “Imagine Willy Wonka but from the mind of Benny Safdie.

Johnson continued, “And I play a septuagenarian man. Now, I didn’t know what the hell that meant. So, I had to Google it, it means you’re in your 70s. So, we transform, and it’s five hours of makeup every day. We’re with Kazu Hiro, who is a legend in Hollywood. He was also nominated for Smashing Machine, for our prosthetics, and he is helping me transform.

“So far, we’re in our second week, and it has already been an unbelievable experience. It’s that thing I was telling the kids, ‘Run towards that thing.’ This is that thing that I ran towards and chased the challenge, and this was a challenge for me. I love Benny, he’s one of my best friends and most embraced collaborators, so I can’t wait for you to see it,” said Johnson.

As Deadline exclusively announced the film based on Daniel Pinkwater’s novel, Safdie told us us that Lizard Music is about “a kid who discovers an island of lizards that are sentient, and they play music, they have broadcast TV. And they want him to come and see them. And he teams up with the Chicken Man, who Dwayne plays, and they go on this adventure to find the land of the lizards.”

“[Johnson] was just talking about how he was slimming down,” said Safdie, after the actor revealed at Toronto International Film Festival that he was undergoing another transformation for the role.

Last October, Amazon MGM Studios’ United Artists scooped up Lizard Music, which is written and directed by Safdie, following his and Johnson’s work together on A24’s The Smashing Machine last year.