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The Massachusetts native said Friday his production company is in the “very early days” of a screen adaptation of Read’s murder case. 

The Bay State’s own Matt Damon announced Friday that his production company is in the early stages of developing a movie about Karen Read, the latest in a string of adaptations tackling the controversial murder case. 

Appearing on “Live with Kelly and Mark” Friday morning to promote his new film “The Odyssey,” Damon told hosts Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos his production company, Artists Equity, is in the “very early days” of developing a movie about Read, though he offered no further information.

With its forthcoming adaptation, Artists Equity joins a handful of other production companies and networks jockeying to bring Read’s sensational case to screen. Lifetime debuted its scripted take on the legal saga in January, while Elizabeth Banks has signed on to play Read in a still-untitled Prime Video limited series. 

Read and her lead attorney, Alan Jackson, have partnered with LBI Productions to develop a scripted adaptation, and Turtleboy blogger Aidan Kearney is working with Compelling Pictures on a docuseries and film about his advocacy for Read’s innocence. Netflix also has a three-part documentary limited series about the case in the works. 

Read, 46, was acquitted last summer of murder and manslaughter charges in the 2022 death of her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe. 

Prosecutors had accused Read of drunkenly backing her SUV into O’Keefe while dropping him off at a house party in Canton shortly after midnight on Jan. 29, 2022. But Read and her lawyers have long maintained she was framed in a coverup, floating an alternate theory that O’Keefe met his fate inside the home. 

While her criminal case is now settled, Read still faces a wrongful death lawsuit from O’Keefe’s family, as well as a defamation suit from several witnesses she sought to implicate in her boyfriend’s death. Separately, Read has filed two lawsuits of her own: one against Massachusetts State Police and the Town of Canton for allegedly negligent hiring and training, and the other accusing witnesses and investigators of conspiring to frame her. 

Abby Patkin

Staff Writer

Abby Patkin is a general assignment news reporter whose work touches on public transit, crime, health, and everything in between.

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