Jon Cohen has joined Wonderlab, the newly launched production company of Final Destination: Bloodlines helmers Zach Lipovsky and Adam Stein, as President.
Cohen comes over from J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, where he most recently served as Head of Film.
“We are so incredibly excited to launch Wonderlab with Jon,” Lipovsky and Stein said. “During his time at Bad Robot, Jon had a discerning eye for discovering some of the brightest genre filmmakers and writers and empowering them to make smart, original movies that connect with audiences. From our first conversations, Jon blew us away with his intelligence and deep creative insights about how to craft great stories. He shares our love of making unique and elevated films that are also incredibly fun and entertaining, and his collaborative nature is a perfect fit for the iterative way we plan to develop new movies at Wonderlab.”
During his tenure at Bad Robot, Cohen produced a wide-ranging slate of features, including 10 Cloverfield Lane as co-producer, The Cloverfield Paradox and Overlord as executive producer. He was also a producer on Lou for Netflix, The End of Oak Street for Warner Bros., and the upcoming J.T. Mollner/Brie Larson film Skeletons, which Sony is set to release in 2027.
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Originally from Highland Park, Illinois, Cohen held executive positions at The Donners Company and Davis Entertainment before joining Bad Robot.
“I couldn’t be more thrilled to be joining forces with Zach and Adam, and to be on the ground floor of what they’re creating with Wonderlab,” said Cohen. “I’ve admired the guys’ filmmaking for a while, and their FINAL DESTINATION: BLOODLINES was the sort of clever, impeccably made and wildly entertaining genre movie that so many aspire to create but very few can. As I’ve gotten to know them better, I’ve only grown more impressed with their ambition, work ethic, taste, story sense and talent, and how it’s all fused to an incredibly collaborative process and mindset that makes everyone who works with them long to work with them again.
Cohen continued, “I’m very grateful to them for this opportunity, and to Sony Pictures for the faith they’ve placed in Wonderlab, and I look forward to making thrilling, surprising and emotionally resonant genre movies with this group for years to come.”
Under a first-look deal with Sony Pictures that has the company developing projects across all of their film labels, Wonderlab projects announced so far include an animated Venom movie for Sony Pictures Animation; video game adaptation Metal Gear Solid; and The Earthling, based on the Jonathan Marty short story, with the latter two projects being developed for Columbia Pictures.
Founders Lipovsky and Stein broke out as the directors of New Line’s Final Destination: Bloodlines, which is now the highest-grossing film in its franchise at around $317 million worldwide. The films above are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to their slate, which also includes a sequel to their 2018 sci-fi thriller Freaks, Warner Bros./Amblin’s Gremlins 3, Universal/Amblin’s Long Lost, Paramount’s The Traveler, and more.
“Wonderlab’s mission is to make movies using an iterative process that surrounds our creators with candid feedback from test audiences and other filmmakers,” Stein and Lipovsky stated. “It’s a process we’ve built over many years to make sure a film is the best it can be. We’re grateful to Tom, Sanford, and Peter at Sony for helping us scale this process across a slate of awesome films in the pipeline.”
