'Crime After Crime' Will Star Awkwafina As A Podcast Host And Ike Barinholtz As An Escaped Convict

Awkwafina continues her meteoric rise to stardom, signing on to star and produce the comedy Crime After Crime. The actress will join Ike Barinholtz, who will also produce and appear in the film. The story, which was no doubt inspired by Serial, follows a true crime podcaster and the escaped convict she agrees to help. There's a lot of potential in this premise, which will hopefully pay off.

According to Deadline, Awkwafina and Barinholtz will produce alongside Nick Stoller and Conor Welch, while Dan Gurewitch and David Young will handle the script. The film follows "a millennial podcast host who agrees to help the convict she's devoted her true-crime podcast to prove his innocence after he escapes jail and turns up at her house." This more or less sounds like a comedy version of the wildly popular first season of Serial, and I'm quite interested in seeing how it all pans out. STX will distribute the film.

I'll confess that up until recently, I was Awkwafina neutral. I had no real opinion on her as a performer, even after seeing her work in Ocean's 8 (I still haven't seen Crazy Rich Asians, I'm sorry, don't yell at me!). Everything changed earlier this year when I caught The Farewell at Sundance. Her performance in the dramedy from director Lulu Wang was nuanced and layered, revealing Awkwafina is capable of bigger, better things. After watching her there, I'm fully converted into an Awkwafina fan, and interested in anything she does next. Crime After Crime sounds like a good move for the actress overall, although I'd like to know who will direct the flick – there's no name attached yet.

In addition to The Farewell, which A24 will release July 12, 2019, Awkwafina is also appearing in the next Jumanji sequel, due out December 13. She also lends her voice to The Angry Birds Movie 2. Barinholtz, meanwhile, released his directorial debut last year – the dark comedy The Oath, which seemed to come and go with very little fanfare. This year, he'll appear in Mindy Kaling's Sundance hit Late Night. He'll also appear in Jordan Peele's Twilight Zone reboot, and is currently filming The Hunt. Earlier this year, his voice work could be heard in The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part. Recently, he made an appearance on Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

No word on when Crime After Crime might be released.