Hammer’s Silver Screen Return?

Mickey Spillane’s New York City private eye Mike Hammer has featured in multiple films over the years, both on the big screen and on television. Now that rough-edged and relentless protagonist may be headed back for yet another working over by Hollywood—thanks in part to author Max Allan Collins reviving his career in a series of books following Spillane’s demise in the early 2000s.

Deadline reports that California production company Skydance Media “has acquired rights to Mickey Spillane’s and Max Allan Collins’ Mike Hammer franchise with plans to develop and produce the bestselling book series as a feature film based on the iconic character.

Entertainment 360 joins as a producer with Skydance’s David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Don Granger producing with Guymon Casady producing for Entertainment 360. Benjamin Forkner and Ken F. Levin will also produce. Collins will executive produce, with Jane Spillane serving as co-producer. Carin Sage will oversee the project for Skydance. ...

The producers have the rights to the Hammer catalog which includes dozens of stories, books and graphic novels authored by Mickey Spillane as well as those co-authored by Spillane and his friend the best-selling author Collins ...

As savvy Rap Sheet followers know, Spillane batted out 13 Mike Hammer novels during his 88 years on Earth, from I, the Jury (1947) to Black Alley (1996). Iowa author Collins, to whom Spillane entrusted his unpublished and unfinished works, released his first “collaborative” Hammer novel, The Goliath Bone, in 2008. Since then, he’s completed another 13 novels, plus a 2016 collection of Hammer short stories, A Long Time Dead. His latest joint venture with Spillane is Dig Two Graves, which was originally due out this month from Titan Books, but has been postponed until mid-September.

(Above) Mickey Spillane himself starred as shamus Mike Hammer in 1963’s The Girl Hunters, opposite Shirley Eaton.

Of previous Hammer movies, Deadline recalls: “The Mike Hammer novel Kiss Me, Deadly was adapted into the classic 1955 film directed by Robert Aldrich and starring Ralph Meeker as Hammer. In 1999, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.” The site goes on to say that “The character has not had a chance for any feature film treatment thanks to a long-winded rights dispute. Spillane passed away in 2006, one month after the death of his manager Jay Bernstein. Bernstein’s estate claimed ownership of the Hammer character. Levin spent several years in court before the rights came back to the author’s estate and a clear title could be delivered for a movie deal.”​

It’s high time Hammer, his barking firearms, and his sexy partner, Velda Sterling, were rediscovered by filmgoers. Let us hope the present strikes by both Hollywood screenwriters and actors doesn’t cause serious delays to this production.

(Hat tip to In Reference to Murder.)