Hey folks, Harry here. Here's another juicy buncha news compliments of that gathering man... Elston Gunn. I comment on a couple of things in this week's edition. But let's just hop right on in, cause this water is cool..
TAKEN FROM VARIETY AND HOLLYWOOD REPORTER
CASTING
* Paul Giamatti will star alongside Martin Lawrence and Nia Long in BIG MOMMA'S HOUSE for 20th Century Fox. Raja Gosnel will direct the film which will start shooting in January. The story follows a cop who pretends to be a Southern granny because he's forced to conceal his identity.
* Jonathan Brandis joins A FATE TOTALLY WORSE THAN DEATH starring Julie Benz, Monica Keena and Christopher Lloyd about a some female high school students who start growing old.
* Tricia Vessey, Jonathan Jackson and Cillian Murphy will play three young patients in an untitled project for director John Carney.
* Chris Kattan joins Nora Ephron's NUMBERS with John Travolta, Tim Roth and Lisa Kudrow.
* Alice Cooper joins the psychological thriller THE ATTIC EXPEDITIONS with Seth Green, Jeffrey Combs and Ted Raimi.
* Richard E. Grant will star in the Australian family pic HILDEGARDE for director Di Drew.
* Sandra Bullock may star in WILDEST DREAMS, a love story about a woman who gets through the death of her husband with the help of supernatural elements. Bullock and MGM are teaming on the Ian Deitchman and Kristin Rusk script for Bullock's Fortis Films.
* John Cleese has signed for three more 007 films as Q's assistant.
* Denis Leary and Hope Davis will star in actor/director Campbell Scott's indie drama FINAL to be shot on digital video. The story follows a man who is found on the street and taken to an institution where doctors explore how he ended up there.
* Laura Theodore and Roy Scheider will star in an indie feature about Janis Joplin for writer/producer Joel L. Freedman. This project, as well as Redeemable Features' Joplin pic starring Lili Taylor and to be directed by writer Nancy Savoca, should start shooting early next year.
* Jennifer Love Hewitt is in talks to star in TRUST ME, written by Mitchell Kapner about a bumbling FBI trainee who attempts to work undercover and finds herself kidnapped by a mobster who falls for her.
* Steven Weber joins the Mike Figgis-directed flick TIME CODE 2000.
HARRY NOTE: I actually stumbled onto this set while I was in Los Angeles this week. It was on SUNSET BLVD down in the lobby of the building where USA tv is located. Next to this kickass book store. I saw Jeanne Tripplehorn and alot of television cameras wandering around... though shooting wasn't quite underway. If memory serves the film has the same AD that worked on THE GREEN MILE, cause he and I talked briefly before I had to go into my meeting.
* Julia Ormond joins Vince Vaughn and Ed Harris in the dark comedy PRIME GIG about a telemarketer who searches for the perfect phone job.
* Gwyneth Paltrow is in talks to star in Paramount's HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS about a womanizer who bets he can stay in a relationship for more than 10 days while the woman he chooses tries to get rid of him.
* Parker Posey, Eugene Levy, Michael McKean and Catherine O'Hara join the cast of UNTITLED DOGUMENTARY PROJECT for Christopher Guest and Castle Rock Entertainment about eccentric dog owners and a canine showdown.
* Lacey Chabert ("Party of Five") joins TART starring Dominique Swain for writer/director Christina Wayne.
* Pauly Shore will star in Trimark's THE BOGUS WITCH PROJECT, a film mix of the studio's acquired 25 spoofs of THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, such as THE BIGFOOT PROJECT, THE WATTS BITCH PROJECT and THE LINDA BLAIR PROJECT.
* Keanu Reeves is attached to star in Warner Bros.' FISHING FOR MOONLIGHT based on the true story of a stockbroker whose life is destroyed when he frees a prostitute from the Russian mafia.
* Leelee Sobieski will star in the thriller THE GLASS HOUSE about an orphaned teenager who is taken in by a Malibu couple and discovers they aren't the caring friends they seemed to be. They may even have caused the death of her parents. Wesley Strick scripted.
* Ashley Judd and Matthew McConaughey are in talks to star in Paramount's DEXTERITY, written by Karen Croner, about a couple working in a factory that goes belly up in a rundown town.
DIRECTOR/WRITER ATTACHMENTS
* Destination Films picked up Ronnie Christensen's spec WILD KINGDOM, a futuristic comedy about an animal control officer charged with tracking down biologically engineered animals before they cause trouble in NYC.
* Jean Claude LaMarre will write/direct STOOP for Ice Cube's Cube Vision. The indie flick is said to be similar to FRIDAY with an East Coast perspective.
* Steve Adams will write ENVY for Castle Rock and exec. producer Larry David about two men who are best friends, neighbors and do the same kind of job for the same company. One of them becomes wildly rich, but continues to live in the same home. The other becomes consumed with envy.
* Brad Silberling (CITY OF ANGELS) is in serious talks to direct the Warner Bros. remake of H.G. Wells' THE TIME MACHINE.
Before you start screaming, we need to see the script... that's where a TIME MACHINE movie will live or die. ---- HARRY
* Scott Wiper will write the big-screen adaptation to Barbara Leibovitz's documentary SALVAGED LIVES about prison inmates who struggle through rehab, particularly deep-sea diving.
* Wayne Rice and Gina Goldman have written SONNY BRIGHT in which a government desk jockey gets mixed up with a beautiful woman and a big heist. Doug Liman is attached to direct with the Farrelly brothers producing for Fox.
* Writer Robert Nelson Jacobs (OUT TO SEA) will work on both HOUSE OF ANGELS, based on the Swedish film ANGLAGAND, and SOLOMON GRUNDY, based on the Dan Gooch novel where a baby becomes an adult in one day and lives an entire lifetime's worth of experiences within one week.
* Michael Sarna will direct DOOMSDAYER with Joe Lara, Brigette Nielsen, J.J. Storm and Udo Kier.
* Kathy Bates may direct THE MOONS OF JUPITER, a John Rieck script about a boy who invokes a miracle to save his family.
* Paul Attanasio (DONNIE BRASCO) will rewrite Akiva Goldsman's THE SUM OF ALL FEARS as the next Jack Ryan pic for Paramount.
* Doug Aarnoikoski is directing HIGHLANDER: ENDGAME starring Adrian Paul and Christopher Lambert for Dimension Films. Paul may star in THE AMBASSADOR which he wrote with Larry Gross--it's a futuristic piece similar to THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO.
* Brian Helgeland will direct his script A KNIGHT'S TALE for Sony. The story follows a peasant who loves to joust, but knows he'll never wear armor. When his master dies, he assumes the identity of the dead knight and gets Chaucer to help him forge his geneaology papers (as Chaucer has fallen on hard times before THE CANTERBURY TALES.)
* Rob Cohen will direct LOST CITY for Phoenix Pictures about a group of college students whose lives are in danger after uncovering a lost Incan City during an archaeological dig in South America.
* MTV Films picked up Shaina Carol's spec FOTHERMUCKERS about a 21 year old whose sexy mom has an affair with his slacker best friend. The son is out to stop the fothermucker.
* Andrew Niccol (THE TRUMAN SHOW) will write and direct RIVER ROAD for New Line about a man who is willing to give up everything to escape his environment.
* Saturn Films has optioned CHAIN by Greg Small and Richard Blaney for John Rice to direct. The story is described as an edgy drama set in contemporary USA, but in the vein of HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER.
* Chris Murphy sold his RAIN DELAY to Paramount about the relationship between a minor league baseball player who never made it and his young protege who helps him turn his life around.
* Charles Kaufman (BEING JOHN MALKOVICH) is loosely adapting for Columbia Pictures Susan Orlean's THE ORCHID THIEF, a non-fiction account of a manager at a plant nursery for the Seminole tribe of Hollywood, Fla. He and three tribesmen were arrested for stealing endangered species of orchids.
* Miramax Films picked up SERENDIPITY by Marc Klein about two college students who meet and fall in love in one night. They let destiny guide their fate and reunite ten years later.
* Icon Prods. picked up Adam Greenman's LOCK BOX for Paramount about a real estate agent in Beverly Hills who falls in love with a psychotic beauty he meets while showing an estate.
* DreamWorks has hired Menno Meyjes to adapt the Charles A. Lindbergh biography LINDBERGH by A. Scott Berg for Steven Spielberg to direct.
MISCELLANEOUS PRODUCTION TIDBITS
* Castle Rock has acqured the screen rights to Stephen King's novel HEARTS IN ATLANTIS. William Goldman will script. The novel contains five interlocking stories which share characters and the theme of Vietnam War.
* Columbia Pictures bought the feature rights to Marvel Comics' DOCTOR STRANGE: MASTER OF THE MYSTIC ARTS for Don Murphy to produce.
HARRY NOTE: AHA!!! Our old friend Don Murphy is up to it again! A great DOCTOR STRANGE movie would rock hard. Sigh... Hell... I even liked that tv movie. Yes... I'm sick.
* Producers Mario Kassar and Andy Vajna will develop back-to-back TERMINATOR sequels with or without James Cameron and Arnold Schwarzenegger. TERMINATOR 3, to be written by Tedi Sarafian and intended for release in 2001, will have a war in the film and lead right into the apocalyptic setting in TERMINATOR 4 to be written by David Wilson. John Connor will be the lead character in both movies.
* Warner Bros. will release a re-edited, renamed and rewritten version of POCKET MONSTERS REVELATION LUGIA (released in Japan this summer) as a POKEMON sequel to hit theaters next summer.
A POKEMON sequel already? Can't say I'm surprised. The madness is real. What grabbed you this week, if anything? THE ORCHID THIEF sounds cool. After BEING JOHN MALKOVICH, Charles Kaufman seems to be a very busy writer. Any websites dedicated to this guy yet? A KNIGHT'S TALE and FOTHERMUCKERS sound interesting as well. For those of you who read/have read these scripts and others, don't hesitate to write a review and send it to Harry. I'm looking forward to the DOGUMENTARY project as well as Ashley Judd and Matthew McConaughey reteaming in DEXTERITY after A TIME TO KILL. Could be cool. How about Pauly Shore and the BLAIR WITCH spoofs. Ehh boy. Harry already mentioned the TERMINATOR news and I didn't put the HANNIBAL holdup in the recap because it's too obvious. Maybe we'll start getting some concrete stuff on this project soon.
Until next week...
Elston Gunn
