The slasher icons of the eighties mostly outgrew their inventors: Freddy Krueger and Michael Myers spent decades in the hands of other writers, directors and studio regimes. Chucky is the exception. Don Mancini dreamed up the murderous doll, wrote every sequel of the original film series, moved behind the camera to direct it and later carried it into television himself. That unbroken authorship is the asset he is now taking to a new agency.

As Deadline first reported, Mancini, a writer, director and producer, has signed with Independent Artist Group (IAG) for representation. At the agency he will concentrate on developing the next iteration of the Chucky franchise while expanding his footprint with a slate of original film and television projects.

Mancini introduced audiences to Chucky in the original Child’s Play in 1988, the story of a serial killer whose soul ends up trapped inside a Good Guy doll, voiced by Brad Dourif. He wrote every follow-up in that original film series, Child’s Play 2 and Bride of Chucky among them, and made his directing debut with Seed of Chucky in 2004, later directing Curse of Chucky and Cult of Chucky (2017).

Over nearly four decades the franchise has become a pop-culture phenomenon, spanning multiple films, a television series and an extensive global merchandising business. Mancini drove the television leg personally as creator and showrunner of Chucky, which aired for three seasons on Syfy and USA Network and introduced the killer doll to a new generation of fans. The show kept franchise regulars in the fold, including Jennifer Tilly and Fiona Dourif, Brad Dourif’s daughter, who joined the saga in Curse of Chucky.

The doll has also proved it can be taken from him. MGM, which held the rights to the original film, released a Child’s Play remake in 2019 without Mancini’s involvement, with Mark Hamill voicing a rebooted, high-tech Chucky. Mancini’s own continuity carried on in parallel, on television.

Beyond Chucky, his résumé runs through some of genre television’s most respected titles: supervising producer on Syfy’s horror anthology Channel Zero, producer on NBC’s Hannibal and writer on HBO’s Tales From the Crypt. On the feature side, his writing credits also include the cult horror film Cellar Dweller. Mancini continues to be represented by attorney Joel VanderKloot of VanderKloot Law.

Deadline closed its scoop with an editorial aside of its own: a new Chucky film feels overdue. The doll’s most recent feature under its creator, Cult of Chucky, is now nearly a decade old, and developing the next one is now the focus of Mancini’s work at IAG.