Hey folks, Harry here to present, once again, another great job by Elston Gunn. There's not a whole terrible lot of superduper exciting stuff from the trades... The Tom WIlkinson casting in the PATRIOT was broke here and at Coming Attractions weeks ago... but hey... They are breaking THE BOY IN THE PLASTIC BUBBLE! Well... on to Elston and the wonderful world of movie news...
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
* Barry Pepper (SAVING PRIVATE RYAN) will play Matty, the lead in New Line's gangster pic KNOCKAROUND GUYS. Seth Green joins and Vin Diesel is in talks to star in the film which is scheduled to start shooting in September.
* Tom Wilkinson will play British Gen. Cornwallis in THE PATRIOT for Columbia Pictures and director Roland Emmerich. Shooting begins Sept. 7 in South Carolina.
* Sandra Bullock will produce and possibly star in WB's THE LIST by the writers of RUNAWAY BRIDE about a guy who gives his girlfriend a list of things she must do before he'll agree to marry her.
* Andre Brougher and Lou Diamond Phillips are set to star in A BETTER WAY TO DIE for writer/director Scott Wiper. Shooting begins this fall in the Midwest on the pic about an ex-cop who is in the middle of a struggle between the FBI and the Chicago underworld who are searching for a missing agent. The story is described as a "tale of redemption in the spirit of a Sergio Leone movie."
* David Paymer and Casper Van Dien will star in the indie road comedy PARTNERS for director Joey Travolta about a drifter and a straight-laced guy who are brought together by a briefcase containing an important computer disk. Vanessa Angel, Jenifer Lewis, Seiko Matsuda, Yuji Okumoto and Donna Pescow star as well.
* Cheri Oteri ("SNL") joins Jon Favreau and Famke Janssen in Valerie Breiman's LOVE AND SEX.
* Dermot Mulroney joins TRIXIE for director Alan Rudolph. Nick Nolte and Emily Watson star.
* Charlie Kinn (BASEKETBALL) joins IN CROWD.
* James Remar (DRUGSTORE COWBOY) joins Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer in WHAT LIES BENEATH for Robert Zemeckis.
HARRY NOTE: James Remar is cool!
* Kimberly Davies joins PSYCHO BEACH PARTY.
* Desmond Harrington (upcoming BOILER ROOM and JOAN OF ARC) has been cast in both MY FIRST MISTER and the indie flick DROP BACK TEN.
DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS
* Alphaville and MTV Films has picked up an untitled pitch from writer Danny Fischer about a young man said to be one of the first white men to join an all-black fraternity at the University of Mississippi. The comedy was pitched to Leonardo DiCaprio and Jason Biggs (AMERICAN PIE) who may be interested.
* Andres Heinz has written the psychological thriller THE UNDERSTUDY, picked up by Phoenix Pictures, about an understudy on Broadway who finally gets a lead role, but may be undermined by her own understudy.
* Independent Pictures grabbed Niels Mueller and Kevin Kennedy's spec THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON (aka KILLING DICK). Alexander Payne (ELECTION) will produce.
* Montel Williams will direct his wife Grace Morley's (who co-wrote with Amy Acton) LITTLE PIECES. Morley will star with Eva LaRue, Jon Seda and Daniel Quinn in the pic about three woman who question their life decisions and head on an adventure to L.A.
* Robert Gordon (LOST WORLD, GALAXY QUEST) has been hired by Sony/Columbia to pen a sequel to MEN IN BLACK though Will Smith will be busy with a Muhammad Ali biopic (with MIB dir. Sonnenfeld) and I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU CHUCK AND LARRY with Nicolas Cage; Tommy Lee Jones is set to join Clint Eastwood in SPACE COWBOYS and direct his adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's BLOOD MERIDIAN.
* Disney bought LONE MAN ON CAMPUS by Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder based on a P.O.V. magazine article about the first male student ina graduate writing program attended by 700 women.
* Porch Light Pictures picked up ROCKET by Susan Armenti and Leslie Smith about a 12-year old girl who befriends a farmer and his horse who face the possibility of losing the farm.
* Music video director Paul Hunter will direct the comedy ATOMIC DOG for Disney aobut a wise-cracking guy who is conned into chasing the galaxy's most dangerous villain through time and space. David Goyer (BLADE) wrote the script.
* David Ayer has written TRAINING DAY for WB and director Davis Guggenheim (upcoming GOSSIP) about a young police officer on his first day with the LAPD and his partner/mentor who turns out to be a corrupt cop.
* Director Nora Ephron is attached to remake the 1945 British comedy VACATION FROM MARRIAGE about a couple who take a year off from marriage and become different people. WB and Bel Air Entertainment are producing the Leslie Dixon (MRS. DOUBTFIRE) script. Ephron will next direct the comedy/drama NUMBERS for Paramount about a TV weatherman who gets some friends together for a lottery scam and end up winning millions. Shooting begins in October with John Travolta in talks to star.
* Disney has picked up the comedy THE BOY IN THE PLASTIC BUBBLE by Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio about a bubble-bound guy and his attempts to fall in love. Paul and Daurio have also set tp SPECIAL at MGM about a guy who fakes a disability to gain sympathy from his fiancee's son.
* Ernest Dickerson will direct BONES with Snoop Dogg attached to the New Line film about a ghost who is awakened 20 years after his murder to get revenge on his killers.
* Suzanne Myers (ALCHEMY) will direct an adaptation of Dawn Powell's 1942 novel A TIME TO BE BORN about a woman who dumps her lover to seek fame and fortune with a wealthy newspaper publisher, but her plans are foiled by an unsuspected person.
* Tom Shadyac and his Shady Acres prods. will work with Ocean Pictures on 20th Century Fox's SLOW MAN to be directed by Shadyac. The story focuses on a man who ages 100 times slower than everyone else--he appears in his 30s, but has been there since the Civil War. His body functions are also 100 times slower than a normal human's.
* Director Marc Forster is digitally shooting EVERYTHING PUT TOGETHER about a suburban couple unable to put their life together after the tragic death of their baby.
* John Schlesinger (MIDNIGHT COWBOY) will direct the gay comedy TWO GENTLEMEN SHARING about a theatrical producer and his young boyfriend bringing culture shock to a small English village.
MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS * Division 1 Entertainment picked up the rights to Jay Neugeboren's IMAGINING ROBERT about his family's battle with one son's mental illness. Robert DeFranco will produce.
* Steven Spielberg and DreamWorks may be interested in producing HARDBALL by John Gatins about an inner-city baseball league in Chicago's gang-filled Cabrini-Green housing project. The offer is out to Jim Carrey to star.
* Warner Bros. is in talks to make a second and third installment of THE MATRIX possibly shooting back-to-back next year. Keanu Reeves will return as will the writing/directing team the Wachowski brothers. No script is in place yet.
* Paramount Pictures has changed the release date of MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 2 starring Tom Cruise from Christmas to May 24, 2000. The DreamWorks/20th Century Fox pic MINORITY REPORT (starring Cruise and to be directed by Steven Spielberg) is scheduled for release June 30, 2000.
* Veteran director John Frankenheimer has a four picture deal with both Miramax and Dimension Films. Dimension's REINDEER GAMES (not included in the deal) will be in theaters this Christmas.
* Trigger Street picked up the rights to Jimmy Vines' NINTH LIFE about a single father who tries to hold up his neighborhood bodega, but after things go wrong he hijacks a taxi cab full of money and heads to Atlantic City with his anarchis punk rock buddy.
* Nicolas Cage has stopped talks to star in CAPTAIN CORELLI'S MANODLIN for director Roger Michell (NOTTING HILL) and Working Title Prods/Universal.
* Sony Pictures Classics will distribute Woody Allen's latest (and 29th) film SWEET AND LOWDOWN, the 1930s-set jazz comedy starring Sean Penn, Uma Thurman and Samantha Morton.
* Buena Vista bought the pitch AT 17 by Matt Manfredi and Phil Hay. It's a tragic love story set in L.A. focusing on the relationship of a girl from the Westside and a Latino from East L.A.
* Jan De Bont and his Blue Tulip Prods. will work with United Artists on THE PAPERBOY with Pedro Almodovar directing the adaptation of the Pete Dexter novel.
It seems the MIB2 development and the MI2 new date were the biggest news items of the week in movieland (JFK Jr. not withstanding--a sad tragedy indeed). Not a lot of casting compared to weeks past (Tom Wilkinson playing General Cornwallis in THE PATRIOT sounds cool), but a lot of directors and writers are busy...especially Nora Ephron. There are a lot of titles and ideas that sound very interesting. I'm intrigued by NUMBERS, SLOW MAN, A TIME TO BE BORN, ATOMIC DOG, HARDBALL and THE ASSASSINATION OF RICHARD NIXON just to name a few. How about you?
Have a good one.
Until next week...
Elston Gunn
