Ridley Scott’s Prometheus has made some news today by first moving from a March 2012 release date opposite Disney’s John Carter of Mars to a summer June 8, 2012 release. Following that move, Michael Fassbender (Inglourious Basterds) has now joined the cast opposite the previously cast Noomi Rapace (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo).
While the storyline for Prometheus is being kept quiet we still know it began as an expected Alien prequel until it became something different entirely, though Scott is quoted saying, “The keen fan will recognize strands of Alien‘s DNA, so to speak, but the ideas tackled in this film are unique, large and provocative.” Rapace plays a scientist named Elizabeth Shaw while Fassbender will play an android.
Fassbender was previously circling Universal’s Snow White and the Huntsman opposite Charlize Theron as the queen, but this deal squashes that one. Although Variety is now reporting the role belongs to Viggo Mortensen, reuniting him with his The Road co-star. And, the Theron chatter doesn’t end there as she too is reportedly up for a role in Prometheus, a character named Vickers.
Speaking of Theron, a role she was once circling in Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar has gone to Naomi Watts. Watts will play Helen Gandy, J. Edgar Hoover’s loyal secretary for 54 years. Leonardo DiCaprio is playing the title character.
Moving along we come to news of the 3D animated DreamWorks feature titled Rise of the Guardians. The film was once simply titled The Guardians with Peter Ramsey directing the pic from a script by David Lindsay-Abaire (Rabbit Hole) adapted from “The Guardians of Childhood,” an upcoming series of children’s books by William Joyce, who will now co-direct. Previously Leonardo DiCaprio was expected to voice the character of Jack Frost, but he has been replaced by Chris Pine who is also joined by Hugh Jackman, Jude Law, Alec Baldwin and Isla Fisher.
The story centers on an evil spirit called Pitch (Law) who becomes bent upon taking over the world by inspiring fear in the hearts of kids everywhere, a group of our greatest heroes — Santa (Baldwin), the Easter Bunny (Jackman), the Tooth Fairy (Fisher), the Sandman and Jack Frost (Pine) — band together for the first time, determined to stand in Pitch’s way. The film is already slotted for a November 21, 2012 release.
(You can ignore this rumor and move to the update below if you wish) Next comes a rumor from the New York Post that Christian Bale (The Dark Knight) has pulled ahead of Javier Bardem and Viggo Mortensen to star as the main character, gunslinger Roland Deschain, in the Ron Howard-directed adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Tower. However, this rumor sounds entirely made up to me once you get to the second casting bit saying “Dexter” star Jennifer Carpenter is rising on the short list for the role of Susannah, as is French/Moroccan Ghita Tazi.
Having read King’s “Dark Tower” series I have a hard time believing anyone other than an African American actress will be cast to play the role of Susannah Dean, the only child of a wealthy black couple suffering from multiple personalities. Naomie Harris, according to a previous New York Post rumor is also a front-runner.
UPDATE: Just after posting this round-up Deadline reports Javier Bardem has officially been offered the lead role in The Dark Tower by director Ron Howard and Universal Pictures. Formal negotiations haven’t yet begun, but the Deadline post does say Bale was in the running so perhaps just the second half of the “Post” rumor was junk.
Now we come to EW where we learn John Travolta is in serious talks to play New York City mob boss John Gotti in Gotti, a film that will apparently span three generations of the crime family. These “serious talks,” however, sounds like a public plea for Travolta to pick up the phone when producer Marc Fiore calls as he tells EW, “We would love to have him… He’s a terrific actor. John Gotti, Sr. — he’s an icon. And so is Travolta … The Gottis have an image already. People know who they are. You can’t just be a good actor, you have to be a great actor who can become John Gotti.” I guess begging in the pages of EW is better than getting your knees dirty.
Fiore also reveals he’s finalizing a deal with Nick Cassavetes (The Notebook) to direct and apparently feelers are out ther for James Franco to play John Gotti Jr., but Franco is said to be just one of many “A-listers” being discussed for the role.
Franco, meanwhile, is getting busy trying to cement himself as a director as much as an actor. Franco is in pre-production on The Broken Tower, a biopic of American poet Hart Crane, in which he wrote and will also star as Crane alongside Michael Shannon. Another of his expected directorial efforts is the announced The Night Stalker based on Philip Carlo’s book, an account of serial killer Richard RamÃrez and his rampage in California during the mid-1980s.
Guess what, that’s not all…
MTV caught up with Franco at Sundance where he told them, “This summer I’m going to direct a movie based on William Faulkner’s novel ‘As I Lay Dying.'” The site reports he’s working from a 160-page script (that’s LONG) and already shot a test of the whole film on New Year’s Day (huh?).
“I shoot a test of the whole movie before I make a movie. So we just shot a test,” he told the site.
Anything else about Franco to mention? How about the fact he had a role in The Green Hornet, stars in Your Highness, stars in Rise of the Apes and is set to star opposite Benicio del Toro and Michael Shannon in Ariel Vromen’s The Iceman. And then just recently it was said he was in discussions to play pornographer Chuck Traynor in Lovelace, a Linda Lovelace film that will be directed by his Howl helmers Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. Kate Hudson has the offer to play the lead role.
Is that enough to fill a schedule? If not, he was rumored for a role in Ridley Scott’s Prometheus (if I wanted to bring this round-up all the way back to the top), but unless we begin operating on 48 hour days I don’t see that happening.
And to add to that, Franco got his arm caught in a mini-fridge and there’s video footage… Check it out!
