Acclaimed Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård (Marvel’s The Avengers, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) has joined the cast of Peter Chelsom’s drama comedy Hector and the Search for Happiness, it was announced today by The Solution Entertainment Groups (The Solution) founders and partners, Lisa Wilson and Myles Nestel, and producers Judy Tossell of Egoli Tossell Film and Christine Haebler of Screen Siren Pictures.
Skarsgård joins the previously announced Simon Pegg, Rosamund Pike and Oscar winner Christopher Plummer. Also appearing in a cameo will be cult German actress Marianne Sägebrecht.
Based on the best-selling novel of the same name by François Lelord, the script is written by Maria von Heland, Chelsom and Tinker Lindsay. The film is a German/Canadian co-production produced by Judy Tossell for Egoli Tossell Film and Christine Haebler for Screen Siren Pictures, with Jens Meurer and Trish Dolman executive producing. Principal photography is slated to begin in January 2013. Wild Bunch Germany is co-producing and distributing in German-speaking Europe and Entertainment One has acquired all rights for Canada.
The Solution is handling international rights to the film and is actively selling the title to buyers at the American Film Market, currently underway. UTA is representing US rights.
Skarsgård has been cast as Edward – a very rich, jaded banker whom Hector befriends on his flight to China; Sägebrecht makes an appearance as one of Hectors favorite patients, MADAME IRINA, a clairvoyant who has lost her ability to see into the future.
The film revolves around Hector (Pegg), an eccentric yet irresistible London psychiatrist in crisis: hes going nowhere and his patients are just not getting any happier! Until one day, armed with buckets of courage and child-like curiosity, Hector breaks out of his sheltered vacuum of a life into a global quest to find out if happiness exists. More importantly, if it exists for Hector. And so begins an exotic, dangerous and hysterical journey.
One of the gurus Hector meets along the way is Professor Coreman (Plummer), leading expert for Happiness Studies at UCLA. Rosamund Pike will play Hectors long term girlfriend, Clara.
Skarsgård and Sägebrecht are extremely engaging and powerful actors who round out the already impressive cast attached to the film, said Wilson and Nestel. Their casting adds weight to the project and continues to build buzz and buyer appeal for ‘Hector’ at AFM, they continued.
We are delighted by the level of talent surrounding this very special film. ‘Hector’ meets an extraordinarily diverse group of characters on his travels. This cast will make each of those encounters extremely memorable, says producer Judy Tossell.
(Photo Credit: FayesVision/WENN.com)
