What is Casting Couch? It’s the casting news roundup with the stiff upper lip, committed to carry on even as we lose Google Reader. Click through for news about what gentlemen like Robert Duvall, Jared Harris, and Charlie Day are doing next.
Leslie Mann
Cameron Diaz is a little bit hit or miss when it comes to comedy. Sure, she’s proven that she’s willing to commit to anything, but she usually has to be backed up by strong material and stronger co-stars to get laughs. That’s why some casting news has just made her next comedy, The Other Woman, go from looking like a risky proposition to looking like a pretty safe bet. THR is reporting that this movie about Diaz realizing she’s the other woman in a relationship and then teaming up with her untrustworthy beau’s wife to get revenge has just cast Leslie Mann in the role of the wife and Game of Thrones’ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as the man. Given Mann’s penchant for being hilarious and Coster-Waldau’s penchant for being an unscrupulous scoundrel, this one should now be guaranteed to contain at least a small handful of great moments. And that’s all we ask.
Jai Courtney
A Good Day to Die Hard didn’t exactly end up being a good movie, but surprisingly enough, one of the big problems with the film didn’t end up being that we had to deal with a lame young actor playing John McClane’s son and failing to fill Bruce Willis’ shoes. Jai Courtney was fine in that film, given the material he was working with, and he showed even more potential as a personality a couple months earlier in Jack Reacher. Hopefully this trend of him being a pleasant surprise continues with his next job, which THR reports is going to come from that YA adaptation we’ve been talking a lot about recently, Divergent. They’re reporting that Courtney will be playing one of the Shailene Woodley character’s main antagonists, the leader of a rival faction who has multiple piercings in his face. Sounds like Courtney better get Rooney Mara on the phone to get some pointers on how to best promote the act of poking metal through yourself. This could be his big break.
Charlie Day
Fresh on the heels of the news that Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, and Charlie Day have all agreed to reunite for another go-around with their Horrible Bosses, Deadline is reporting that there’s yet another new project in the pipeline that’s going to see Sudeikis and Day reuniting with their Horrible Bosses director, Seth Gordon. The film is called One Night on the Hudson, and it’s coming from a script by TJ Fixman that’s about a rookie police officer and a criminal he’s captured going on the lam after they run afoul of some crooked cops. One can only assume that Day is going to be playing the criminal, which should give him plenty of opportunity to really sleaze it up in that way that only Charlie Day can. It’s still not clear what’s supposed to be funny about Jason Sudeikis, so rookie cop sounds like an excellent role for him too. Good fits, all around.
Jared Harris
Have you ever known one of those schlubby dudes who really have nothing going for them, but somehow always seem to be dating women that are out of their league? That’s kind of the guy Paul W.S. Anderson has been during the casting of his new 3D gladiator movie, Pompeii. Despite the fact that he’s never directed anything worth a damn, he somehow keeps finding ways to add actors with promising careers to his cast. First it was Sleeping Beauty’s Emily Browning and Game of Thrones’ Kit Harington, and now Heat Vision is reporting that he’s signed up Mad Men vet Jared Harris as well. The film sees Harington playing a slave turned gladiator who wants to save his owner’s daughter/his true love (Browning) from being betrothed to a corrupt Roman general. Harris will be playing the slave owner/father, which should give him another chance to show us some of that delicious cruelty he displayed in Sherlock Holmes: A Games of Shadows. But, Paul W.S. Anderson? Really? Did none of them watch The Three Musketeers?
Robert Duvall
It looks like Robert Downey Jr. has found an old dude with enough juice to play his alzheimer-suffering dad in The Judge. Early reports said that the studio wanted a big name for the role, and that they were trying to coax Jack Nicholson out of retirement for it, but now Variety is reporting that Robert Duvall is the name they’ve settled for. Wow, when you use the words “Robert Duvall” and “settled for” in the same sentence, you know you’re dealing with a movie that’s got some aspirations. This one is going to be directed by David Dobkin, and it will see Downey playing a big city lawyer who has to go back to his home town after his elderly father becomes a murder suspect. The next step in the casting process seems to be finding an actress for the role of Downey’s ex-girlfriend, and Variety’s report says that the choices have been narrowed down to either Vera Farmiga or Elizabeth Banks. Come back in the next few days and chances are we’ll have some word on who was able to come out on top. It’s just that easy.
Previously on Casting Couch: Kyra Sedgwick heads back to the big screen…