EXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros has closed deals with Akiva Goldsman and Overbrook Entertainment to produce another installment of I Am Legend, the 2007 hit film. The intention is for Will Smith to reprise his role as scientist Robert Neville, who was the last man on Earth doing battle with a mutated mob in New York City after an apocalyptic man-made virus wiped out the population. A deal was made with Arash Amel to write the script. The film is not being called a prequel, which had been rumored for the past few years. But clearly Warner Bros sees more room to roam on a film that grossed $584 million worldwide. The original film is based on the novel by Richard Matheson.

Smith won’t commit until the script is ready and I haven’t heard yet where I Am Legend director Francis Lawrence stands on the whole thing. The other quandary is this: If it isn’t a prequel, how to get past Smith’s character’s demise at the first film’s end? These of course are semantics in the tentpole game. Warner Bros and Legendary Pictures are casting a continuation of 300, another hit film where all the major characters croaked. Amel is a hot scribe; his script Grace Of Monaco, the film about Grace Kelly that will be directed by La Vie En Rose‘s Olivier Dahan with Pierre-Ange Le Pogam producing and financing, has all the young actresses salivating. Buyers are also waiting to pounce. CAA made the deals.