Father Geek here... annnnnd here's another great...
THE WEEKLY RECAP...
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
* Dennis Quaid is in final talks to star in the remake of THE FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX for director John Moore, 20th Century Fox and producer John Davis. Production is slated to begin in October.
* Woody Harrelson is in talks to join Pierce Brosnan and Salma Hayek in New Line's AFTER THE SUNSET.
* Rosario Dawson is in negotiations to join the cast of Oliver Stone's ALEXANDER, playing the role of Roxanne. Jared Leto has also been set to co-star in the pic playing Hephaistion, Alexander's top general and his lifelong companion.
* Kelly Ripa will lend her vocal talents to the indie feature toon DELGO from Fathom Studios. Jennifer Love Hewitt, Louis Gossett Jr., Val Kilmer, Michael Clarke Duncan, Chris Kattan, Eric Idle, Sally Kellerman and Burt Reynolds also star. The 3-D CGI film follows the fantasy adventures of Kyla and Bogardus, youths from different races on a planet facing extinction.
* Stephen Adly Guirgis joins Todd Solondz's PALINDROMES opposite Ellen Barkin. It's an ensemble movie centering on the family of a 13-year-old girl.
* Hayden Panettiere will star in the live-action/CG pic RACING STRIPES opposite the voices of Frankie Muniz, Dustin Hoffman, Whoopi Goldberg, Joe Pantoliano, Mandy Moore and Patrick Stewart for director Frederik Du Chau (QUEST FOR CAMELOT) and Alcon Entertainment. Also joining the cast of voices is Joshua Jackson, Michael Rosenbaum, Steve Harvey, David Spade, Michael Clarke Duncan and Jeff Foxworthy. Shooting begins Sept. 15 in South Africa. It's the story of an abandoned baby zebra that grows up believing he's a racehorse. With the help of barnyard friends and teenage girl who dreams of being a jockey, he overcomes prejudice and self-doubt to pursue his dream of running with thoroughbreds.
* Anne Heche, Elizabeth Banks, Dule Hill and Kerry Washington will star in SEXUAL LIFE, an indie pic to be directed by Ken Kwapis. They join Tom Everett Scott, Azura Skye, James LeGros and Kevin Corrigan in the project that follows the various intertwined relationships of a group of adults.
* Kevin Corrigan ("Grounded for Life") joins the DreamWorks comedy ANCHOR MAN: THE LEGEND OF RON BURGUNDY, starring Will Ferrell.
* Natalie Cole, Mick Hucknall, Lara Fabian and Mario Frangoulis have joined the Cole Porter biopic DE-LOVELY, singing Porter hits in production numbers during the film.
* Jennifer Coolidge and Regina King (both of LEGALLY BLONDE 2) have joined the cast of Warner Bros. Pictures' A CINDERELLA STORY, starring Hillary Duff, for director Mark Rossman.
* David Alan Basche and Patrick Warburton will star in the indie pic FIRST TIME CALLER for co-writer/director Paul Sullivan. It's about a late-night radio talk show host who one evening receives a mysterious phone call that he and his listeners believe came from an extraterrestrial. This phenomenon riles the eccentric townspeople into an all-out hunt to find out the identity of the mystery caller.
* Ashton Kutcher and Paul Walker have expressed interest in starring in THE DUKES OF HAZZARD, based on the television show, for Warner Bros, with Anthony Anderson as Boss Hog and Britney Spears as a potential Daisy Duke.
* Sigourney Weaver and Emile Hirsch will star in the indie drama IMAGINARY HEROES for director Dan Harris (X2 co-writer) abpit a four-member family and how they deal with the suicide of the eldest son, an accomplished swimmer idolized by the community and his parents as being the "perfect boy."
* William H. Macy is in negotiations to star opposite Kim Basinger in the upcoming New Line thriller CELLULAR for director David Ellis, Electric Entertainment Co. and Lloyd & Kass Entertainment.
* Susan Sarandon and Marisa Tomei are in talks to join the cast of Paramount's untitled remake of the 1966 romantic comedy ALFIE for director Charles Shyer. The project begins shooting in September with Jude Law, Sienna Miller and Nia Long also starring.
* Will Ferrell is attached to star in GET SMART, based on the 1960s' TV series, for Warner Bros. Pictures.
* Rachel Weisz will star opposite Emma Roberts in the indie pic DAISY WINTERS for writer/director Beth LaMure about a 12-year-old girl and her emotional struggle with her mother's losing battle with cancer. After her death, the girl fears she will have to live with her terrible aunt, placing her in a race against time to find an alternative plan. Along the way she uncovers the father she never knew. John Wells and Peyton Reed are producing.
* Benjamin Bratt joins the cast of THUMBSUCKER, starring Keanu Reeves, Tilda Swinton, Vincent D'Onofrio, Vince Vaughn, Lou Taylor Pucci and Kelli Garner. The project is adapted from a novel by Walter Kirn.
* James Carpinello will play John Travolta's son in Artisan Entertainment/Marvel Studios' THE PUNISHER for director Jonathan Hensleigh.
DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS
* Gary Fleder is in talks to direct Paramount's JAILHOUSE LAWYER for producers Mark Gordon and Dylan Sellers. Doug Richardson wrote the script with a rewrite by Will Rokos. It's about a prison convict serving a life sentence who is given the opportunity to defend a fellow inmate in court.
* Steven Shainberg (SECRETARY) will direct a biopic centering on photographer Diane Arbus with Erin Cressida Wilson set to adapt from the biography by Patricia Bosworth.
* Nicole Conn (CLAIRE OF THE MOON writer/director) has launched Little Man Prods., whose first project will be a documentary about the premature birth of her son Nicholas James Baba-Conn. After his birth, Conn and her cameras gained access to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, filming 150 hours of footage during his 158 days in critical care. Caught on camera were many emotional moments, including four surgeries on the infant.
* Valerie Horwitz will adapt Jane Stanton Hitchcock's novel SOCIAL CRIMES for Phoenix Pictures, with Joel Schumacher eyeing to direct. The story revolves around a New York socialite who plots revenge against a social climber who killed her husband and dethroned her from her high society life.
* Amy Heckerling is set to direct SWEAT at Fox 2000 Pictures, from a script by Eric Wald (A VIEW FROM THE TOP). The project is described as SHAMPOO set in the world of athletic personal training.
* Silver Films has acquired feature rights to Stuart David's debut novel NALDA SAID. Yousaf Ali Khan will direct for producer Janey de Nordwall from a script by Kathryn Akuhata-Brown.
* MGM picked up the script DEVIL'S CREW by Ravi Bains and Alex Harakis for Zide/Perry Entertainment to produce. The script centers on the story of Lt. Robert Maynard, a Royal Navy officer who volunteered for a suicide mission to track and kill the notorious pirate Edward Teach (aka "Blackbeard") in the waters off the Carolinas in 1718.
* Emily Baer is attached to write HERE COMES THE BRIDE for Disney and Cosmic Entertainment about a newly engaged couple from different backgrounds trying to plan and execute a New Year's Eve wedding. As their plans become increasingly difficult to realize, they begin to doubt whether they belong together.
* Peter Care (THE DANGEROUS LIVES OF ALTAR BOYS) will direct the remake of BILLY JACK for Intermedia Films for producer Frank Laughlin, with Tom Laughlin, Delores Taylor, Moritz Borman and Basil Iwanyk as exec producers. John Fusco (HILDAGO) is writing the script.
* Director Chris Weitz and writers David Rosenthal and Joseph Matthew Smith have secured the cooperation of the Montreal Film Festival for an unusual stunt of creating an as yet untitled comedy about a fictitious director, named Jake Barrymore, who is scheduled to screen a film called SEE THIS MOVIE in the Canadian city. The title will actually appear in the Montreal Film Festival program, and is scheduled to screen during the fest. However, the film doesn't yet exist. The Weitz/Rosenthal/Smith comedy will chronicle Barrymore's scramble to produce the film in time for the screening. The two films -- the Weitz/Rosenthal/Smith untitled comedy and the film-within-the-film -- will be produced simultaneously over a 10-day period. Weitz will exec produce, Rosenthal will direct and Smith will produce the comedy. Rosenthal and Smith scripted.
* Todd Field (IN THE BEDROOM) will direct an adaptation of Gene Smith's novel AMERICAN GOTHIC for DreamWorks, Wonderland Films, Standard Film Co. and Mirage Enterprises. Scott Smith (A SIMPLE PLAN) adapted the a novel about brothers Edwin and John Wilkes Booth.
* Spitfire Pictures has teamed with Grand Via on Scott Johnson's script STRANGER ON THE SHORE, a dark thriller in which a judge travels to his hometown to confront the ghosts of his past and revisits a murder committed there 25 years ago.
* Warner Bros. purchased the family comedy spec script SAY UNCLE written by Scott Bindley and to be directed by his brother, William. Karz Entertainment will produce. It's about a Maxim magazine-bred bachelor who, while visiting his brother and sister-in-law, unexpectedly finds himself having to take care of their young children for several nights when the brother's wife goes into labor and the duo desert him for the hospital.
* Amy Rardin and Jessica O'Toole have sold the family comedy pitch IMAGINARY LARRY to Odd Lot Entertainment about a young boy's imaginary friend named Larry. When the boy grows up and Larry is no longer needed, Larry finds himself banished to the secret world of unwanted imaginary friends. Banding together with other discarded "IFs," Larry sets out to regain the attention of his creator and along the way saves the world from losing its imagination.
* Scott Rosenberg (CON AIR) will script an update of 1977 thriller THE SENTINEL for Universal and producer Kevin Misher. That pic followed a fashion model who moves into a Brooklyn brownstone only to discover it's the site of a gate to hell.
* Gurinder Chadha (BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM) will direct TUCKER AMES for Fox 2000. It's a comedy centering on a multibillionaire computer mogul who decides to go AWOL right in the middle of testimony for a civil suit. He finds refuge by getting hired at a small theater company where he falls in love with the play's director and learns some self truths while playing a less-than-flattering caricature of himself.
* Nigel Cole will direct A LOT LIKE LOVE for Disney/Beacon Pictures about a twentysomething couple who find each other at the wrong time. Colin Patrick Lynch wrote the script. hstone Pictures Dec. 19.
* Phillip Noyce has come aboard to direct Lakeshore Entertainment's feature adaptation of Philip Roth's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel AMERICAN PASTORAL. The story focuses on Seymour "Swede" Levov, a legendary high school athlete and devoted family man who is living the American dream in thriving, triumphant postwar America. His picture-perfect life unravels when he faces the harsh reality that his daughter Merry has become a revolutionary terrorist bent on destroying everything he has valued in the life he has built for his family. John Romano adapted the screenplay, which is being produced by Tom Rosenberg and Gary Lucchesi.
* Gore Verbinski is in talks to direct Nicolas Cage, who is in negotiations to star, in Escape Artists' THE WEATHER MAN, written by Steve Conrad (WRESTLING ERNEST HEMINGWAY). It's about a divorced Chicago weatherman up for a new job on a network morning show in New York. As he is preparing to leave for the Big Apple, he must make peace with his ex-wife and kids. Production is scheduled to begin in February.
MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS
* MGM is in talks to option the Washington Post article "Bride and Joy: Guiding Mom Down the Aisle" as a vehicle for Goldie Hawn to star in and produce through her Clearlight Prods., a division of Cosmic Entertainment. The article, written by Francesca Segre, appeared in the Post on Sept. 30. It's about a single young woman who must plan her mom's wedding and finds herself in the unlikely position of being the "mother of the bride" to her own mother.
* Director Peyton Reed has dropped out of 20th Century Fox's feature comic book adaptation of FANTASTIC FOUR due to "creative differences."
* Barry Sonnenfeld has pulled out of Columbia's FUN WITH DICK AND JANE comedy remake starring Jim Carrey and Cameron Diaz. Columbia and producer Brian Grazer of Imagine Entertainment are now planning to mount production with the cast intact next March after Carrey has wrapped on LEMONY SNICKET for Paramount and DreamWorks.
* H2O Motion Pictures and Brightlight Pictures have pacted to co-produce five pics including PEOPLE WHO KNOCK, an adaptation of the Patricia Highsmith novel penned by Doug Taylor and directed by Lynne Stopkewich; the Samuel L. Jackson starrer RUNNING WILD, based on the novel by J. G. Ballard, scripted by David Leland; WHITE CLOUDS, based on a script by Dennis Potter and set to shoot next year in Italy; WITH PREJUDICE, based on the New Yorker article "Harriet, the Spy Club" by Ted Friend with a script by Michael Stokes; and PEACHLAND, which combines romance with Latin music and dance, written by Kate Schlemmer and to be directed by Spanish helmer Maria Ripoll.
* Scout Prods. and Edgartown Ventures have acquired the life rights of boxer "Irish" Micky Ward and his brother, trainer Dick Eklund, with Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson set to write a screenplay for a planned feature.
* Workshed Entertainment has optioned remake rights to Bob Clark's 1972 feature film DEAD OF NIGHT for Eli Roth (CABIN FEVER) to direct. It's about a young man killed in the Vietnam War. Through a series of circumstances, he is brought back to life as a zombie. When he returns home to his small town, his friends and family assume that he is shellshocked from the war and are unaware that he is a creature with a murderous lust for blood.
GUNN SHOTS
(NOT from the trades)
* Anatomy of a Fight is a stark yet funny look at New York's suburban life, and the colorful people that live there. More information can be found at http://www.nxflix.net
* Call for Entries - 6th Annual TULSA OVERGROUND - August 16 & 17, is a two-day, non-competitive film festival showcasing innovative short films and videos from around the world. A cinematic grab bag of first-time filmmakers, student directors, professional lensers, and big name auteurs. All formats, styles, and genres. Deadline: postmarked by JULY 18. For more info go to: http://www.tulsaoverground.com
* The website for the Tolkien fan documentary RINGERS: LORD OF THE FANS is now live. Visit the website here: http://www.theonering.net/ringers/index.html
* Joe Johnston Fans: There's a new website dedicated to the director. Check it out at http://uk.geocities.com/johnstonfans/
* Check out the short Russel Crowe spoof internet movie titled A BEAUTIFUL MIND OF A GLADIATOR. See it at http://www.abmoag.com/
* New York-based production company Souvenir Pictures today announced the signing of a deal for their independent romantic comedy, FUNNY VALENTINE, with Los Angeles-based producer representative Lantern Lane Entertainment, Ltd. FUNNY VALENTINE is a romantic comedy starring Anthony Michael Hall and Marlo Marron (MI VIDA LOCA), and features Ivan Martin (PEOPLE I KNOW) and Lord Jamar ("Oz"). For more information visit http://www.funny-valentine.com
* There's a BATMAN short pre-dating DEAD END by several years. See BATMAN: THE LAST LAUGH at http://www.vtr.co.uk/clientaccessNew/pickled/?id=e41d3ba121d36de
* Whether it's on 8, Super8 or 16 millimeter, Home Movie Day honors the celluloid movies of your community. The founders of Home Movie Day know that the amateur film heritage of your neighborhood, city and sate is a rich one and their goal is to project those films on the big screen for all to see. Did you know that your original films can long outlast any video OR digital transfer? Don't throw away your film! Check out the website for updates & more information http://www.homemovieday.com.
