With director Tim Burton‘s Dark Shadows opening this weekend, I recently got to interview screenwriter Seth Grahame-Smith. Starring Johnny Depp as a vampire who awakens in 1972 after having been buried for 200 years, Dark Shadows is based on the 1970s TV series with the same name and it also stars Eva Green, Michelle Pfeiffer, Chloe Moretz, Jackie Earle Haley, Gulliver McGrath, Helena Bonham Carter, Bella Heathcote, Ray Shirley, and Jonny Lee Miller.  For more on the film, here’s 20 images, 9 clips and 12 minutes of behind-the-scenes footage from the set, and Matt’s review.

During my extended interview with Grahame-Smith, we talked about how he got involved in the project, his anxiety about having his first film released, how John August contributed to the project, deleted scenes, and what might be on the Blu-ray.  In addition, with Grahame-Smith involved in some other high profile projects, we also talked about the Beetlejuice sequel, Tim Burton’s Night of the Living, Unholy Night, and a lot more.  Hit the jump to check it out.

Having previously collaborated on Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Dark Shadows, it comes as little surprise that screenwriter Seth Grahame-Smith and Tim Burton are teaming up yet again.  The Pride and Prejudice and Zombies author will reportedly pen Night of the Living, a stop-motion animation custom-made for the dark director.  According to Grahame-Smith, the story idea had been brewing for years, but he took it to Burton while the duo worked on Dark Shadows. Grahame-Smith also noted that Burton’s stop-motion films Frankenweenie and Corpse Bride struck him as an ideal format for Night of the Living. Plot details are limited, but we previously reported that the movie might revolve around a “a town of peaceful monsters who must learn how to fight when it is invaded by humans.” Hit the jump for more.

David Katzenberg and Seth Grahame-Smith and their KatzSmith production company have signed a two-year first-look deal with Warner Brothers.  One of the first projects under that deal is a Beetlejuice reboot because of course it is.  For those who haven’t seen the original: stop making me feel old.  Tim Burton’s 1988 comedy starred Michael Keaton as the eponymous character, a mischievous ghoul who teams with a young woman (Winona Ryder) to get her parents out of their new home so it can be restored to its dead owners (Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin).  Deadline reports that the deal grew out of Grahame-Smith’s screenwriting work on Tim Burton’s next film, Dark Shadows, an adaptation of the 1960s horror TV series.  Grahame-Smith, who came to popularity out of his gimmick novels Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (film adaptations are in the works for both), is contracted to write two scripts under the deal and Beetlejuice could be one of them.

Hit the jump for other projects KatzSmith has in the works.