Dead like Me: Life After Death | |
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Directed by | Stephen Herek |
Written by | John Masius Stephen Godchaux |
Based on | Dead Like Me by Bryan Fuller |
Produced by | Hudson Hickman Sara Berrisford Craig Roessler Irene Litinsky |
Starring | Ellen Muth Callum Blue Sarah Wynter Jasmine Guy Britt McKillip Christine Willes Cynthia Stevenson Henry Ian Cusick |
Cinematography | Bruce Chun |
Edited by | Michel Aller |
Music by | Kevin Kiner Richard Marvin |
Production company | |
Distributed by | 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment |
Release date |
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Running time | 87 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Dead like Me: Life After Death is a 2009 American fantasy comedy-drama film directed by Stephen Herek [1] and written by John Masius and Stephen Godchaux, based on the short-lived 2003 television series Dead Like Me created by Bryan Fuller.
Laura Harris, who played Daisy Adair in the series, was unavailable to return to the role and was replaced by Sarah Wynter. The rest of the returning cast reprised their roles, with new character Cameron Kane played by Henry Ian Cusick. The film was released on DVD on February 17, 2009, one month after its debut on Canada's Super Channel.
A crew of "reapers", whose job is to extract the souls of people who are about to die, find themselves confronted by change as their habitual meeting place, Der Waffle Haus, burns down the same day their boss and head reaper Rube disappears (having "gotten his lights"). They soon meet their new boss, Cameron Kane, a slick businessman who died falling from the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. He outfits them with color-coordinated smartphones and treats them to luxurious accommodations – teaching them, as Roxy (Jasmine Guy) puts it later, that "nothing we do here matters." This tutelage leads the reapers to perform such misdeeds as saving those they were meant to reap (Roxy); abusing immortality for financial gain (Mason, played by Callum Blue); letting a soul wander, instead of showing him "his lights" (Daisy); and otherwise selfishly focusing on their wants. [2]
Georgia "George" Lass (Ellen Muth), the movie's narrator, is fired from Happy Time, a temp agency, after she loudly reprimands an employee for delivering a report late. The employee quits and later sues for harassment. George ends up revealing her identity to her sister Reggie (Britt McKillip). George finds herself reminiscing with Reggie and helping Reggie prepare for the death of her boyfriend, Hudson Hart (Jordan Hudyma). [2]
George's fellow reapers confront Kane and learn that he had realized and did not care that the "pebbles" of their misdeeds would cause "waves" of misfortune elsewhere. Unhappy with his style of management, they try to deduce how exactly a fellow reaper can be killed. They shoot and drown him to no effect before finally dismembering and cremating him. His ashes are then shot into orbit along with those of Murray, the cat belonging to George's boss Delores. [2] At the launch, Delores tells George that the employee who had sued her for harassment had done so at several of the employee's previous jobs, and George is reinstated, now with a corner office.
The reapers walk away from the launch, wondering who their new boss will be. George, after seeing her sister and mother drive off on vacation, finds herself suddenly showered with Post-Its falling from the sky, like the Post-Its their former leader Rube had used to deliver their reaping assignments. George realizes she has been selected as the group's new leader. [2]
In June 2007, a casting call was posted on an entertainment industry website for the role of Daisy Adair, formerly played by Laura Harris, who was unable to reprise the role due to commitments with Women's Murder Club . It noted that John Masius wrote the film and also confirmed that Mandy Patinkin, who starred in the original series, was not in the film. In August 2007, it was confirmed that Sarah Wynter would take over the role of Daisy Adair from Laura Harris. Harris and Wynter previously played sisters in the second season of 24 . Henry Ian Cusick would play a new character named Cameron Kane. [3]
The film's release date was set for July 2008 [4] and later rescheduled and released on February 17, 2009. [5] An exclusive television debut occurred on January 16, 2009, on SuperChannel in Canada. [6] It has also been shown in the United States on Syfy.
Gavin McGregor Rossdale is a British musician, best known as the lead singer and rhythm guitarist of the rock band Bush. He helped form Bush in 1992; on the band's separation in 2002, he became the lead singer and guitarist for Institute and later began a solo career. He resumed his role in Bush when the band reunited in 2010. In 2013, he received the British Academy's Ivor Novello Award for International Achievement.
Dead Like Me is an American comedy-drama television series starring Ellen Muth and Mandy Patinkin as grim reapers who reside and work in Seattle, Washington. Filmed in Vancouver, British Columbia, the show was created by Bryan Fuller for the Showtime cable network, where it ran for two seasons (2003–04). Fuller left the show five episodes into Season 1 because of creative differences; creative direction was taken over by executive producers John Masius and Stephen Godchaux. A direct-to-DVD film titled Dead Like Me: Life After Death was released on February 17, 2009.
Danielle Andrea Harris is an American actress. She is known as a "scream queen" for her roles in multiple horror films, including four entries in the Halloween franchise: Halloween 4 (1988) and Halloween 5 (1989) as Jamie Lloyd, and Halloween (2007) and Halloween II (2009) as Annie Brackett. Other such roles include Tosh in Urban Legend (1998), Belle in Stake Land (2010), and Marybeth Dunston in the Hatchet series (2010–17). In 2012, she was inducted into the Fangoria Hall of Fame.
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Henry Ian Cusick is a Peruvian-Scottish actor of television, film, and theatre and a television director.
Sarah Wynter is an Australian actress, known for her roles on American television – such as Kate Warner on the television drama 24, as Beth on Windfall, and as Keitha on Flight of the Conchords.
Ellen Muth is a retired American actress best known for her role as Georgia "George" Lass in Showtime's series Dead Like Me.
Laura Elizabeth Harris is a Canadian actress who has appeared in a wide variety of movies and television shows. She is probably best known for her roles as Marybeth Louise Hutchinson in The Faculty (1998), Maggie in Severance (2006), Daisy Adair in Dead Like Me, and Marie Warner in Season 2 of 24. She took a hiatus from acting in 2015 after almost 28 years, but began reappearing in roles from 2021. She is sometimes credited as Elizabeth Harris and Laura E. Harris.
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Bryan Fuller is an American television writer and producer who has created a number of television series, including Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Pushing Daisies, Hannibal, American Gods, and Crystal Lake. Fuller worked as writer and executive producer on the Star Trek television series Voyager and Deep Space Nine; he is also the co-creator of Star Trek: Discovery.
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Britt Analisa McKillip is a Canadian actress and singer. Her credits include the film Scary Godmother: Halloween Spooktacular and its sequel Scary Godmother: The Revenge of Jimmy, and her role as Reggie Lass in the television series Dead Like Me, the film Dead Like Me: Life After Death, and her voiceover roles as Cloe in Bratz and Princess Cadance in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and Princess Harumi in Lego Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu.
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Rovin' Tumbleweeds is a 1939 American Western film directed by George Sherman and starring Gene Autry, Smiley Burnette and Mary Carlisle. Written by Betty Burbridge, Dorrell McGowan, and Stuart E. McGowan, the film is about a cowboy congressman who exposes a crooked politician who is delaying passage of a flood control bill.
"Entrée" is the sixth episode of the first season of the psychological thriller–horror series Hannibal. The episode was written by Kai Yu Wu and series creator Bryan Fuller from a story by Wu, and directed by Michael Rymer. It was first broadcast on May 2, 2013, on NBC. Although it was the seventh episode produced for the season, it was the sixth in scheduled order.
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