The Doctor in the Hallway News Report 03.21.07
Posted by Ben Moser on 03.21.2007
Jolie in a Wanted role, Johansson in the role everybody wanted, Hermione might not be what Emma Watson wanted, and more. All this and more in this week's Doctor in the Hallway News Report. Read it, or I'll name you in a steroid scandal.
Why hello, kids. Could it be already time to welcome you back to The Doctor in the Hallway News Report? If you said "yes," then I have you right where I want you. You'll now foolishly believe everything I say. You'll hand on my every word. You'll delight in knowing what to think because I have told you so. You'll want to thank me for taking the time to inform you in such a way. But I don't do it for the thanks. I do it in the vague hope that I'll become an internet celebrity one day by doing nothing too far above or beyond writing a weekly column. But don't tell anyone I said that.
Let's news it up.
Jolie is Wanted…duh
Universal Pictures has set Angelina Jolie to star alongside James McAvoy and Morgan Freeman in Wanted, an action film based on a graphic novel written by Mark Millar that Timur Bekmambetov will direct.
McAvoy will play a young man who discovers his father is a super-villain, only to learn shortly thereafter that his dad has been murdered. The youth is drafted to follow in his father's footsteps. Jolie will play an assassin who teaches the ropes to the wannabe killer.
I've explained to you in earlier versions of this column that it's acceptable to break an old lady's legs to read this story if you have to, so I'll save telling you about how brilliant it is for when the pic is about to hit the screen and I'm telling you how much you need to see it. Instead, let me tell you about the character that Jolie will be playing. She'll be playing the Fox, who is basically walking sex with a gun. So let's just go ahead and agree that the casting is great. McAvoy and Freeman are both brilliant choices for their characters as well.
God help me, I love comic book movies.
Scarlett Johansson: Porn Star
When it comes to getting down and dirty onscreen, Jenna Jameson knows exactly who she wants to do it for her. Scarlett Johansson is being lined up to play porn sensation Jenna in a movie of her life story.
The stunning actress has been handpicked by adult movie legend Jenna as her personal choice for the lead in a film adaptation of her book, "How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale."
Jenna is currently in talks with producers and hopes filming will begin next year.
The thing I have to emphasize here, as if you're still reading rather than doing backflips over the idea of Johansson doing some of the more graphic scenes that the role would require, is that this is just who Jameson wants in the lead. Would it be a good move for Scarlett? I think so. And not just because even the tease of a nude scene with her in it would translate to automatic bank. I watched Jenna's True Hollywood Story, and her life is the kind of thing that wins talented it-girls like Johansson more awards than she can swim in.
See Scarlett? Everyone wins.
Here's my resume to play a porn star.
Of course you realize, this means war.
New Line has won feature rights to Microsoft and Epic Games' hugely popular videogame Gears of War with Stuart Beattie writing and Marty Bowen and Wyck Godfrey producing via their Temple Hill banner.
Remember how much I love comic book movies? I hate video game movies even more. There is not one adaptation of a video game to the big screen that has been anywhere even close to good. There have been big screen versions of 70's sitcoms that weren't terrible. There have been live action adaptations of children's cartoons that were pretty good. There are musical movies based on musicals that are based on old movies that are very entertaining. But not one. Good. Video. Game. Adaptation.
Hell just froze over…well, it got a little cooler at least
After years of buzzing around development circles and different studios, The Green Hornet is finally on its way to the bigscreen.
The Green Hornet follows the adventures of Brit Reid, a millionaire publisher who moonlights as a masked crime fighter. It started as a radio serial hatched by Lone Ranger creators Fran Striker and George Trendle in 1936 -- traveling to comic book, film and TV by the 1960s -- but recent attempts to develop it for the big screen hadn't panned out.
So it looks more or less official now. You'll forgive me for being skeptical, but this thing has been rumored to happen so many times with Kevin Smith, George Clooney, and almost the entire Hollywood populace being attached in some way. I'm pretty sure that at one point, I was on board to write, star, and direct the picture with Grant Hill picking up the tab.
So you'll hear no more of this from me until something starts being committed to film. I'd sooner report on the status of a world reunion tour of The Police.
Oh, the angsty teenage years are so magical(see what I did there?)
Movie studio Warner Bros. has played down reports Harry Potter star Emma Watson is quitting the film franchise, insisting they are "extremely confident" she will continue to play Hermione Granger. British newspaper News Of The World quoted the 16-year-old's Potter co-star Rupert Grint as saying, "Emma doesn't want to do it any more. She's tired of being known as 'that girl from Harry Potter'." However, a spokesperson for producers Warner Bros says, "We're extremely confident that Emma will be back for films six and seven." Filming for the sixth movie, Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince, is scheduled to begin later this year.
Of course she wants to do something different. She's 16. She's rebelling. She wants to hang out at colleges and try to pick up skeezy boys more than she wants to be in a movie based on a children's book no matter how famous it makes her. The good news for her? Being the star of a movie will get her wicked high awareness among skeezy college boys.
I wanted an excuse to type Filliam H. Muffman
Movie beauty Jessica Alba was taught to act by husband-and-wife Hollywood stars William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman. Before finding fame, the Sin City star enrolled on an intensive six-week long course at the Atlantic Theater Company that Macy founded with writer David Mamet. And Alba has mixed memories of the grueling experience. She tells PageSix, "Felicity was very hard on me. She's a tough cookie, that one. I just remember her making me cry because I didn't prepare a scene right, or I didn't talk loud enough."
I love Macy and Huffman. They're brilliant and talented and believe in good things. Let me just leave it at that. Well, let me add that I don't think that – as far as Alba's concerned – those two are going to be standing in front of a "Mission Accomplished" sign anytime soon.
You know who taught me this pose? Yep. William H. Macy
That'll do it for this week…
Call me crazy, but I'm really interested in TMNT this weekend. I'm not saying it will be good. I'm not saying it will be bad. I'm just interested. So there's your pick of the week.
Until the pick of next week, don't do anything I wouldn't do.
(This week's sources: Variety, All Headline News, IMDB)
