After a 10-year hiatus, HBO is bringing back Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s moviemaking reality show Project Greenlight for a fourth season. The reality show had a novel concept—Damon and Affleck, who started their careers by pushing Good Will Hunting through the Hollywood development process, would pick an aspiring writer and director and give them the chance to make their own film as cameras followed them through the process. The show ran for two seasons on HBO, and a third on Bravo.
The original three seasons did in fact result in three completed films: The indie dramas Stolen Summer and the Shia LaBeouf-starring The Battle Of Shaker Heights, and the horror movie Feast. This year’s competition entries are already viewable online, and one of those film’s directors will be the subject of Greenlight’s new season. (Spoiler alert: It’s the guy who made it into the trailer.)
Affleck claims this is “the riskiest season we’ve ever done,” although the reason why isn’t clear. HBO has neither confirmed nor denied whether the directors of losing entries will be fed to sharks, but it would add a lot of risk if they were. Less dangerous are the Farrelly Brothers, who will be on hand this season to mentor the young filmmaker at the center of the show, possibly because people still want famous faces attached to this story of a struggling nobody, and Affleck’s a little busy right now.