Father Geek here, just in from the Alamo Drafthouse screening of SPIDER-MAN, and it kicked my butt, but not so much as to keep me from posting Elston's latest report on everything that happened out in Hollywoodland during the latest work-week... Lots of coolness you may have overlooked during those hurried coffeebreak surfing sessions. Sooooo once again Father Geek is turning you over to the nimble fingers of our man Gunn and...

The WEEKLY RECAP...

TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

CASTING

* Ed Harris is in talks to join Cuba Gooding Jr. in RADIO for Revolution Studios and director Mike Tollin. Shooting begins this fall. It's about the true-life story of a white football coach in a small South Carolina town who befriends a mentally challenged black man who is barely literate. Under the coach's mentoring, their relationship helps transform the social dynamics of the team and the school. Mike Rich (THE ROOKIE) scripted.

* Kirsten Dunst is in talks to star in GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING for director Peter Webber. Production begins in August. Ralph Fieenes is attached to play the male lead.

* Michael Michele is in final talks to star opposite Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson in Paramount's HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS for director Donald Petrie (MISS CONGENIALITY). Shooting starts in June in New York.

* Natasha Richardson will co-star with Jennifer Lopez and Ralph Fiennes in Revolution's THE CHAMBERMAID. Wayne Wang directs.

* Robert de Niro will produce and possibly star in a remake of the Japanese crime drama KAOSU, which is being developed as a vehicle for Benicio Del Toro. It's about a young grifter who gets involved in the kidnapping of the wife of a wealthy businessman. The woman is all too willing to be tied up and stored in the grifter's house when the kidnapper leaves to make his ransom demand. Things become complicated when he returns home and finds the woman dead.

* Brian Cox will play father to Edward Norton's character in THE 25th HOUR for director Spike Lee. Based on the novel by David Benoiff, the project chronicles the last day of freedom for a young man before he begins a seven-year jail term for drug dealing.

* Kate Winslet is in talks to star opposite Johnny Depp in NEVERLAND for Miramax and director Marc Forster (MONSTER'S BALL). Production begins mid-June in London. The project is based on Allan Knee's play THE MAN WHO WAS PETER PAN, about how James M. Barries's relationship with four fatherless boys and their mother led to the creation of Peter Pan.

* Kate Beckinsale will star in the action pic UNDERWORLD for Lakeshore Entertainment, Screen Gems and director Len Wiseman. It's described as "Romeo and Juliet" set in the world of vampires and werewolves.

* Naomi Watts will star opposite Heath Ledger in the Gregor Jordan-helmed NED KELLY. Geoffrey Rush, Rachel Griffiths, Orlando Bloom, Joel Edgerton and Peter Phelps also star.

* Marcia Gay Harden, Rita Moreno, Daryl Hannah, Susan Lynch, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Vanessa Martinez join Mary Steenburgen and Lili Taylor in CASA DE LOS BABYS for writer/director John Sayles. Shooting begins this summer in Mexico. It's about six American women who travel to an unnamed South American country with hopes of adopting a baby.

* Los Angeles Lakers forward Rick Fox is in talks to join the cast of Walden Media/Phoenix Pictures' HOLES for director Andrew Davis, as well as the indie pic AUGUST AND EVERYTHING AFTER for director J. Mills Goodloe.

* Jerry Springer will star opposite Christopher Lambert in the thriller CITIZEN JURY. Larry Smith will direct the project, written by Tony Clark and Frank Rehwaldt.

* Halle Berry will star in and produce a remake of the 1974 pic FOXY BROWN, and character study BROWN-EYED GIRL, both for MGM.

* Penelope Cruz joins and Jeff Bridges is in talks to join Bob Dylan, Jessica Lange and Luke Wilson in MASKED & ANONYMOUS for director Larry Charles and Intermedia Films.

* Barry Pepper will star in THE SNOW WALKER about a pilot in the 1950s who crashes his plane in the North and gets aid from a female Inuit to help him survive the climate. Charles Martin Smith will direct from his own adaptation of a Farley Mowat short story. Pepper will also join the cast of Spike Lee's THE 25th HOUR.

* Luke Wilson will star with Kate Hudson in ALEX AND EMMA, a modern adaptation of Dostoevsky's short story THE GAMBLER, which Rob Reiner is set to direct this fall.

DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS

* Universal Pictures is in final talks to option Astonish Comics' HEROBEAR & THE KID to be produced as an animated feature for Chuck Gordon's Daybreak Prods. and Adrian Askarieh's Prime Universe Prods. Mike Kunkel created the series about a little boy named Tyler who inherits a stuffed polar teddy bear from his dead grandfather. The bear comes to life as a superhero and the duo embark on adventures together. Kunkel is attached to direct the project and will co-write the script with Jeph Loeb.

* Sharon Maguire (BRIDGET JONES'S DIARY) will develop and direct the English-language remake of the German film ALLES BOB! (EVERYTHING BOB!) for Scott Free Prods. The feature is a modern comedy that follows the adventures of Bob, a philanderer who is about to give up his bachelor life to marry a beautiful, wealthy woman whom he doesn't truly love. When he falls in love with an older woman with three children, he begins to realize that true love may be more important than money

* 20th Century Fox and Regency Enterprises have purchased an untitled pitch, described as a live-action dog musical, that Daniel Bernstein will write with Jonathan Treisman producing. Bernstein also will write the musical lyrics for the film. The pitch is based on a story treatment titled WHEN BOGEY MET GARBO, by Joseph Lawson, which Treisman optioned and enlisted Bernstein to come aboard.

* Steve Faber and Bob Fisher have been hired to do a rewrite on the Montecito/DreamWorks Pictures comedy CRIMINAL PROCEDURE.

* Actor-producer Jeff Fahey has optioned Christopher Dean Johnston's comedy script TRAILS OF THE WARLOCK for Fahey to produce through his Leadville Pictures with TriCoast Studios. It's about an inept man who attempts to earn his legacy as a serial killer.

* The Coen brothers are in talks to write and direct a remake of the Peter Sellers/Alec Guinness British black comedy THE LADYKILLERS. The original centered on four accomplices in a robbery who try to kill their indestructible elderly landlady. The new project is set in the South and revolves around an eccentric lady who unwittingly rents out rooms in her house to a gang of professional thieves. They plan to use the innocent address as a hideout while they plot a big heist. However, they find they're no match for the woman. Barry Sonnenfeld and Tom Jacobson will produce.

* Miramax has optioned Brent Goldberg and David T. Wagner's (NATIONAL LAMPOON'S VAN WILDER) script A HORSE'S TALE to be developed into an animated pic. The story is told from a circus horse's point of view.

* Richard Eyre (IRIS) is in talks to direct THE ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN with Juliette Binoche attached to star and Javier Bardem being courted to join her. Anthony Minghella and Leigh Jackson have written the screenplay, based on Katie Campbell's novel. Eyre (IRIS) is also attached to direct COMPLEAT FEMALE STAGE BEAUTY, a comedic drama set in 17th century England. Based on playwright Jeffrey Hatcher's work of the same title, the Artisan Pictures project tells the story of a leading stage actor who is playing women's roles in 1661 England. When the king declares it illegal for men to act in women's roles, the great thesp finds himself downsized. Tribeca Films will produce with Artisan.

* Tim Burton will direct BIG FISH, based on the book by Daniel Wallace, for Columbia Pictures. John August wrote the script. It's about exaggerator Edward Bloom and his son William, who returns home only to find out his father is dying of cancer. Desperate to know the man before it's too late, William searches to distinguish fact from fiction, with much of the story told in flashback.

* Spyglass is developing ANGEL OF DEATH about the true story of Efren Saldivar, who poisoned patients at the Glendale Activist Medical Center, and the investigator, Sgt. John McKillop, who helped crack the case. Saldivar was sentenced to life without parole for six of the murders. James Manos ("The Sopranos") has written a script and production is expected to begin late summer.

* Producer Hawk Koch Jr. and writer/director Michele Ohayon are working on STEAL A PENCIL, the true story of two lovers whose courtship took place while they were separated in a concentration camp. They reunited in Amsterdam after he was liberated by the Russians and she by the Americans. The two lived happily ever after in America. Koch and Ohayon may also develop a feature version of the documentary COLORS STRAIGHT UP at Morgan Freeman's Revelations banner. Robert Dolman (upcoming THE BANGER SISTERS) is writing a script.

* Sony has grabbed the THE PRICE, a supernatural thriller set in a hospital written by Alex Sokoloff and Kimball Greenough. Laura Ziskin (SPIDER-MAN) will produce the pic, the plot of which is being kept under wraps.

* Gore Verbinski is in final talks to direct PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN for Jerry Bruckheimer and the Walt Disney Co.

* King of Pop Michael Jackson is teaming with writer-director Bryan Michael Stoller on a big-screen adaptation of Jennings Michael Burch's book THEY CAGE THE ANIMALS AT NIGHT for Icon Prods. Stoller will adapt and co-direct with Jackson. The book is the true story of the author's account of being left at an orphanage and bouncing around from one foster home to another.

* Spyglass Entertainment has picked up the comedy pitch FEELS LIKE THE FIRST TIME from brothers Steven and Daniel Altiere that Maverick Entertainment also is producing. It's about a relationship-phobic woman who returns to her high school past to prevent her younger self from losing her virginity to the boy who dumped her on prom night.

* Frank Oz is in talks to direct POWERS, based on the Image Comics book, for Columbia Pictures and producer Mace Neufeld. The story centers on homicide detective Christian Walker who solves crimes that are superpower-related. This project will have him lead an investigation into a killer who has been knocking off, one by one, the band of superheroes that had been securing peace and enforcing good will in the country.

* Tony Scott is in talks to direct Universal's AMERICAN CAESAR for Red Wagon Entertainment. William Nicholson (SHADOWLANDS) wrote the script about a modern-day Caesar and Brutus story set in the U.S. Army. In the story, a populist general takes over the White House, but things get interesting when one of his officers detects danger in the general's hidden mission.

* New Line Cinema picked up the car racing comedy script DIESEL DEBUTANTES from scribes Gregg Rosen and Brian Sawyer for Urban Entertainment to produce. It's about a twentysomething debutante who inherits a losing race car team only to become the lead driver and turn the team's odds around.

* Myriad Pictures has purchased the script INDIGO from writer Alex Torres. It's being described as a supernatural thriller about astral projection in the vein of FLATLINERS.

* Brett Ratner (RUSH HOUR) is in early talks to direct Paramount's PAYCHECK, based on the short story by Philip K. Dick, about a man who has part of his memory erased and must find clues to his past and use the information to uncover a government secret. Dean Georgaris wrote the screenplay.

* Universal, Fox and Paramount are in a ferocious bidding battle for the script THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW, a big-budget, high-concept sci-fi film in which the world is ravaged by global warming. Rolan Emmerich will direct the script he co-wrote with Jeffrey Nachmanoff. It's about an abrupt climate change that has dramatic consequences for the world. It looks likely that production would begin in the fall.

* Jim Isaac (JASON X) will direct SKINWALKERS for Gold Circle Films about two sects of battling werewolves; one embraces their nature, while the other fights the beast within.

* Ron Nyswaner will adapt the Intermedia/Pacifica project TRIAL BY JURY which Sam Raimi is attached to direct and produce. It's based on author-historian D. Graham Burnett's nonfiction book, based on his experience as a jury foreman in a gruesome New York murder case. The case included transvestitism, male prostitution and rape and a jury sequestering that lasted four days.

* Nick Guthe will direct his dark comedy script MINI'S FIRST TIME for RKO Pictures. The story centers on a promiscuous Beverly Hills girl who falls in love with her stepfather and plots with him to kill her alcoholic mother.

* Firm Films has optioned the feature rights to the novel TRUTH OR DIE by Guy Toubes and David Ackerman. The project will be adapted by Craig Borten and Melissa Wallack and is described as a 1960s-set pic about a newly graduated medical researcher who gets a call from the government offering him a high profile job in the field. At first, he thinks his research will be used to find cures for terminal diseases, but he later finds out that his research is being used to develop biological warfare. Borten and Wallack are also working on a pitch about an ex-con who becomes a coach to a reform school football team and ends up trying to prevent the players from following the path he took.

* Mike Hodges will direct Clive Owen, Charlotte Rampling, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers and Malcolm McDowell in the noir thriller I'LL SLEEP WHEN I'M DEAD. Trevor Preston wrote the pic about a former gang boss who is drawn back into the game to avenge his brother's tragic death.

MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS

* Gavin and Greg O'Connor, via their Solaris shingle, have optioned film rights for TV: A NOVEL, by Brian Brown. The book follows the advent of television through the life of Caesar Fortunato, a directorial maven in television sports and inventor of the instant replay. But his dissolute lifestyle finally catches up with him when his network is bought out by a media giant and his new boss refuses to deal with him.

* Cowboy Pictures and Janus Films will jointly re-release a new print, with new subtitles, of Akira Kurosawa's THE SEVEN SAMURAI. The film will be nationally released in the fall and winter.

* Vin Diesel has opted not to star in Universal's sequel to THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS. Instead, the project will be built around Paul Walker's cop character Brian O'Conner. However, Diesel is still attached to star in CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK for whick Akiva Goldsman has been tapped to do a rewrite.

* MGM and Bruce Willis' Cheyenne Enterprises have signed a first-look deal for projects from Stan Lee's new company, POW! Entertainment. Three superhero action-adventures are already in consideration: THE FEMIZONS, with Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelman attached to script; THE DOUBLE MAN, with Antoine Fuqua attached to direct a script by Alan McElroy; and NIGHTBIRD, with negotiations to bring in a writer.

* Filmmaker William Gazecki (WACO: THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT) has launched OpenEdge Media, a production company focusing on documentaries. The company is in production on three projects and has over a dozen in development. These projects include CROP CIRCLES: QUEST FOR TRUTH; INTO THE MYSTIC, about psychotropic plants and psychedelic use throughout history; and GOD'S TRUTH: THE ORPHANS OF DUPLESSIS; a story of injustice and coverup by the Catholic Church.

* Intermedia Films has picked up remake rights to BILLY JACK while a deal for DreamWorks to remake HAWAII FIVE-O has changed from being exclusive negotiator to one of several bidders in the new pic.

* Andrew Lauren Prods. has optioned Melvin Jules Bukiet's novel AFTER, with Srdjan Dragojevic (PRETTY VILLAGE, PRETTY FLAMES) attached to direct from his own screenplay. It's a post-Holocaust heist film in which three survivors try to steal a 64-cubic-foot block of gold, made from the melted fillings of murdered Jews.

* Independent producer Jim Miller has optioned movie rights , through his IKO Prods., to the Sea Monkeys toy that famously promised children the opportunity to "create instant life." Miller is shopping the idea of a CG-animated SEA MONKEYS feature to several studios.

* Quentin Tarantino will executive produce a project based on the Marvel comic series, MORT: THE DEAD TEENAGER for Maverick Films. The movie's main character, Mort, is a teenager who is beheaded in a train accident at the start of the film. He descends in the Netherworld and meets Teen Death, the son of the Grim Reaper, and the two have some adventures.

Until next week...

Elston Gunn

elstongunn@hotmail.com