Legendary Entertainment and Hasbro’s live-action Magic: The Gathering movie is one step closer to reality. According to two new reports, Stranger Things and Inside Out 2 star Maya Hawke has been cast in a lead role in director Matt Johnson’s adaptation of the 33-year-old trading card game. Hawke’s role has not been announced, but one report says the actor is filling a “key” role in Magic: The Gathering.
Deadline and independent reporter Daniel Richtmann broke Hawke’s casting in Magic: The Gathering on Wednesday, marking the first cast member to be attached to the project. Matt Johnson, the director of Blackberry, Tony, and Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie, is helming the adaptation and writing the script with Noah Gardner and Aidan Fitzgerald.
Hawke is best known for her roles as Robin Buckley in Netflix’s Stranger Things, Anxiety in Pixar’s Inside Out 2, and June Douglas/Lucretia Shaver in Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City. (She’s also pretty well known for being the daughter of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke.) Hawke will next appear in The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping as Wiress.
Johnson is an avowed and longtime Magic: The Gathering fan. He said in an interview with The Big Picture podcast earlier this year that his childhood dream “was to be a professional Magic card player,” but that he gave up that dream after competing in a pro tour against player Richard Hoaen, “who just beat the shit out of me,” Johnson said.
“To me, [Magic is] my Star Wars,” Johnson said. “Getting to revisit a world that I know so well, that I love so much, that meant so much to me, it’s surreal to be able to do a project like that.”
Vulture reported earlier this year that Johnson’s Magic movie is inheriting “parts of the Dune production apparatus for the project,” including storyboard artists, costume designers, and locations. Legendary is reportedly planning Magic: The Gathering as a trilogy of films.
Legendary Entertainment and Hasbro Entertainment announced plans for a “live-action feature film and television universe” based on Magic: The Gathering in February 2025. Hasbro’s plans also include an animated series based on the card game for Netflix, which is currently in production under showrunner and executive producer Terry Matalas (Star Trek: Picard, VisionQuest).