Earlier this month, we announced disappointing casting news in that Blake Lively (Gossip Girl, Green Lantern) would join the lengthy list of actresses who have turned down the leading role of Elizabeth Bennet in the big-screen adaptation of the Jane Austen/Seth Graham-Smith book, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. What could befall the production now?

Deadline reports that director Craig Gillespie (Fright Night, United States of Tara) has officially left Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Gillespie follows Mike White and David O. Russell (The Fighter, Three Kings) in the line of directors who have left the project. Reportedly, the departure was “amicable but had to do with things like who to cast in the film.”

Who would you want to see direct Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and who would you cast in it?

The Lionsgate film employs a script penned by both the book author Seth Graham-Smith and Marti Noxon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Mad Men). Natalie Portman, who passed on the starring role, will be producing Pride and Prejudice and Zombies along with Annette Savitch, Richard Kelly, Sean McKittrick and Tedd Hamm.

Book Summary:

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies — Pride and Prejudice and Zombies features the original text of Jane Austen’s beloved novel with all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie action. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton—and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she’s soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers—and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield as Elizabeth wages war against hordes of flesh-eating undead. Complete with 20 illustrations in the style of C. E. Brock (the original illustrator of Pride and Prejudice), this insanely funny expanded edition will introduce Jane Austen’s classic novel to new legions of fans.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is slated to hit theaters in 2013.