Stacy Osei-Kuffour to write Marvel’s Blade starring Mahershala Ali

Playwright Stacy Osei-Kuffour has been tapped to pen Disney and Marvel’s Blade reboot.  Two-time Oscar-winning actor Mahershala Ali is playing the titular half-vampire, half-mortal superhero.

According to Variety, the deal makes Osei-Kuffour, best known for writing HBO’s Watchmen, Amazon’s Hunters, and the Hulu series Pen15, the first Black woman to pen a Marvel Studios project.

Created by writer Marv Wolfman, Blade first made an appearance in the 1973 comic book The Tomb of Dracula #10 as a supporting character. He is a vampire hunter–half-mortal, half-immortal–who tries to free the world from vampires as a way of avenging his mother, who was killed by a vampire as she gave birth to him.

Diversity behind the scenes is the focus of Marvel’s Phase Four, under which filmmaker Nia DaCosta has been roped in to direct Captain Marvel 2, becoming the first Black woman to helm a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie.

No director is attached with Blade reboot yet.