Neon's upcoming horror film Brides from Watcher director Chloe Okuno just received an update, leaving fans in a good news/bad news situation. Bad news first. Maika Monroe (Longlegs, It Follows) will no longer star in the vehicle that would have reunited her with Okuno after the pair worked together on Watcher.
The good news is that she's been replaced by Olivia Cooke, who is also a great actress and no stranger to the world of horror, having starred in Thoroughbreds, Ouija, and Bates Motel, though nowadays she's best known for playing Alicent Hightower in House of the Dragon.
Deadline shares that Monroe had to drop out of the project due to scheduling issues with her film Reminders of Him, an adaptation of the Colleen Hoover novel of the same name in production from Universal Pictures.
Okuno made her feature directorial debut with Watcher, a Hitchcockian thriller about a woman who believes a man living across the street from her new apartment in Budapest is stalking her and she struggles to get anyone, even her own husband, to believe her. Okuno also directed the award-winning short film Slut and introduced us all to the terrifying Raatma from the "Storm Drain" sequence in V/H/S/94.
For Brides, Monroe was meant to play the character Sally Bishop. Sally and her husband travel to a luxurious Italian villa and find themselves unnerved by the owner, a mysterious count who takes an interest in Sally. It's inspired by Dracula's brides from the original story. It seemed like part of the reason Neon snapped up the rights in the first place is thanks to the success of Monroe's previous Neon project, the serial killer Longlegs co-starring Nicolas Cage.
Even though it's unfortunate that we'll be missing a second collab between Okuno and Monroe, I'm still excited to see Brides and I have no doubt that Cooke will be a great replacement. Monroe still has several horror and thriller projects in development, including the highly-anticipated It Follows follow-up, They Follow. a remake of The Hand That Rocks the Cradle, and In Cold Light.
Her film Reminders of Him is a romantic drama also starring Tyriq Withers, Rudy Pankow, Lauren Graham, Lainey Wilson, and Bradley Whitford. Filming is already underway and will wrap in June, with the film securing a February 13, 2026 release date.
Brides will receive a theatrical release and filming is expected to begin somewhat soon, especially if that's the reason for Monroe's scheduling issues regarding her Universal movie. Funnily enough, the Brides news is a reversal of another casting change that happened recently, with Monroe stepping in for The Substance star Margaret Qualley for the movie Victorian Psycho.
Meanwhile, Cooke's upcoming projects include the psychological thriller series The Girlfriend for Prime Video, the Irish horror film Visitation, and a black-and-white thriller called Switzerland.