Iconic production company Hammer, an Exclusive Media company, has acquired the rights to Gaslight, an original screenplay written by newcomer Ian Fried, it was announced today by Simon Oakes, Vice-Chairman of Exclusive Media and President & CEO of Hammer, and Guy East and Nigel Sinclair, Co-Chairmen of Exclusive Media. Hammer will develop and produce Gaslight for the big screen.

The screenplay landed on Hollywood's Blacklist of the best unproduced scripts in 2011 and is an atmospheric thriller in the vein of From Hell meets Silence of the Lambs. Secretly imprisoned in a London insane asylum, the infamous Jack the Ripper helps Scotland Yard investigators solve a series of grisly murders whose victims all share the iconic death brand: dual puncture wounds to the neck.

Tobin Armbrust, President of Worldwide Production & Acquisitions of Exclusive Media, Hammer's parent company, will oversee the project for Hammer.

Armbrust commented, "Ian's script is an atmospheric thriller that reads like a Gothic Silence of the Lambs. He does a fantastic job of weaving iconic characters into a plausible and entertaining story."

The project was brought to Exclusive Media by the company's Creative Executive, Jennifer Ruper.

Ian Fried is currently writing an original supernatural action project called Spectral for Legendary Pictures. His previous script, The Ever After Murders, featuring fairy tale characters investigating murder scenes, also landed on Hollywood's Black List in 2010.

Fried is repped by Daniel Cohan and Mike Esola at WME, Prolific Entertainment and attorney Eric Suddleson.