What is Casting Couch? Despite the fact that the movie business seems to be slow to get back to work after the long weekend, it’s a column that’s managed to dig up a couple exciting casting coups.
Bryan Singer out-scooped everybody in the news breaking business today when he suddenly started tweeting big updates on how the cast for his upcoming X-Men: First Class sequel, X-Men: Days of Future Past, was developing. He started off small by first confirming that a few members of the First Class crew would be returning. He tweeted, “I’d like to officially welcome back James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender, & Nicholas Hoult to #XMEN for #DaysOfFuturePast.” But then he got a little crazy and started confirming rumors that actors from his original X-Men movies will be joining the film as well by tweeting, “Thrilled to announce @ianmckellen118 (Ian McKellan) & @SirPatStew (Patrick Stewart) are joining the cast of #XMEN #DaysOfFuturePast #magneto #professorX More to come…” Do you think we could get scenes where old Professor X and Magneto meet young Professor X and Magneto? The head spins with awesome possibilities.
Lenny Kravitz
Now that he’s had impressive turns in both Precious and The Hunger Games, Lenny Kravitz has proven that we don’t need to wince when he moves from the world of recording music into the world of film acting. As a matter of fact, he’s looked so promising in his first few roles that it would probably be interesting to see how he handles being the lead. Which is fortuitous, because Deadline is reporting that director Julien Temple (Earth Girls Are Easy) is going to give him just that in his upcoming biopic of Marvin Gaye. Reportedly this still-untitled look at Gaye’s life will focus on the period in the ’80s when he was trying to get his addictions under control and his career back on track. Can you picture Kravitz as the Motown legend? Yeah, me too, it’s not that hard. Good casting.
Ben Mendelsohn
Ryan Gosling’s directorial debut, How To Catch a Monster, seems to be coming together rather well. Not only does it already have Mad Men’s exceptional and underrated Christina Hendricks cast in a lead role, but over the weekend MovieHole got word that it’s also picked up Aussie actor Ben Mendelsohn (Animal Kingdom). There’s no word on who Mendelsohn will be playing, but it’s thought that How To Catch a Monster is supposed to be about a mother and her two sons stumbling into a dark, fairy tale world. Seeing as Mendelsohn playing one of Hendricks’ kids would be completely ridiculous, is it possible he could be the titular monster? Intrigue!
Minnie Driver
What is Return to Zero? A couple of days ago it was just an anonymous indie drama. But, after a casting report from THR, it’s now an on-the-radar indie drama that’s starring Minnie Driver, Paul Adelstein, and Alfred Molina. From writer/director Sean Hanish, Return to Zero is a pretty difficult-sounding drama about a couple whose relationship is in trouble getting pregnant after already having one baby die in the womb. Driver and Adelstein will be playing the couple and Molina their doctor. Sounds like a bummer. Probably don’t watch this one with any pregnant people. Or people looking to get pregnant. Or, heck, probably you should just watch this one by yourself.