Producer Obst enlists DeRoy as VP

By KATHLEEN O'STEEN

With production activities at a full hum on the 20th Century Fox lot, producer Lynda Obst has brought on Anna DeRoy as her vice president of development and production.

Obst recently returned from Texas, where she stepped in to quash filming problems on the set of Fox's "Bad Girls," starring Madeleine Stowe, Mary Stuart Masterson, Andie MacDowell and Drew Barrymore.

The film, which recently wrapped principal photography, was directed by Jonathan Kaplan, who was brought in to replace Tamra Davis.

Davis left three weeks into filming, citing creative differences, and the production shut down for several days.

Meanwhile, Obst's company, which signed a two-year first-look deal at Fox 10 months ago, has a number of projects in its coffers, among them "Crisis in the Hot Zone," based on the New Yorker article about killer viruses that suggests the emergence of AIDS may be a consequence of destruction of the tropical biosphere.

The project, going through rewrites, is one of the high-priority items on Obst's development list.

She also is developing a comedy anthology based on "The Ten Commandments," which will employ different writers and directors for each commandment seg.

DeRoy most recently was director of creative affairs at Madonna's Maverick Picture Co., where she spearheaded the acquisition of Dario Scardapane's "Rainy Day Men" and Janet Brownell's "The Year of Frank Sinatra." Before that, she spent four years as director of development at Amblin Entertainment.