UPDATE: By the pricking of our thumbs, a correction this way comes. Deadline have shot down The Tracking Board's intelligence with their own version of these unfolding events. While they confirm that Tina Fey is working with Disney producing an "Untitled Witch Project", they say the film in question is not a sequel to Hocus Pocus, but a stand-alone project "in the vein of Ghostbusters". Apologies to Hocus Pocus fans, but there is apparently no follow-up to that "classic" in the works anymore at all.
Back in April when news of the project first emerged, the word on the street was that Disney had in mind "leads in the vein of Tina Fey and Melissa McCarthy" for its developing Hocus Pocus sequelboot. The Mouse House has just seen the first half of that wish come true (at least to some extent): Tina Fey has joined the project as a producer, via her Little Stranger production company. It's unclear yet whether she's planning to star as well as oversee.
Yes, we are talking about the same Hocus Pocus, the 1993 family comedy starring Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy as a coven of witches accidentally resurrected at Hallowe'en by youngsters Omri Katz, Thora Birch and Vinessa Shaw.
According to The Tracking Board's intel, the new film will pick up years later, and centre on a housewife related to the original witch trio. When her children get on the wrong side of some other witches while they're out trick-or-treating, she teams up with a local witch-hunter to save them.
Fey, we'd imagine, is being courted to play the mom, with the no-doubt broader witch-hunter role the one Disney would like McCarthy (or their "McCarthy type") for. With Fey aboard, however, it's not impossible that it could turn into a vehicle for her and regular comedic BFF Amy Poehler. There seem to be no plans to bring back any of the original stars, but cameo reappearances don't seem out of the question.
That's all total speculation for the time being, since we're a long way from a cast or a director... or anything. With Fey's involvement though, Hocus Pocus 2 is suddenly looking more interesting than it might have done. We'll keep you posted.