‘Conjuring 3’ Draws ‘Curse of La Llorona’ Director Michael Chaves

By Dave McNary

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – New Line has hired “The Curse of La Llorona” director Michael Chaves to helm “The Conjuring 3.”

“” will be the sixth movie in New Line’s Conjuring Universe, which has grossed $1.57 billion at the worldwide box office to become the highest-grossing horror franchise of all time. Last month’s “The Nun” is now the most successful of the five films.

James Wan, who directed and produced the first two “Conjuring” movies through his Atomic Monster production company, will produce “The Conjuring 3” with Peter Safran of The Safran Company. “The Conjuring 2” writer David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick is returning to script.

Chaves teamed with New Line and Atomic Monster on “The Curse of La Llorona,” which opens on April 19. He was discovered after directing the horror short “The Maiden.”

Chaves directed “The Curse of La Llorona” from a script by Mikki Daughtry and Tobias Iaconis. The film stars Linda Cardellini as a social worker and widow raising her two kids in 1973 Los Angeles, who finds similarities between a case she’s investigating and the supernatural occurrences haunting her own family — which turn out to be La Llorona, a well-known figure in Mexican folklore who is the ghost of a woman who has lost her children and causes misfortune to those nearby.

“The Curse of La Llorona” is not part of the “Conjuring” universe. Chaves is repped by Paradigm and Hirsch Wallerstein Hayum Matlof + Fishman. The news was first reported by the Hollywood Reporter.