Briefly: I don’t know what Russell Crowe‘s agent is doing, but it is working. Casting news and rumors have been thick of late for the actor. Though he said the report of MGM looking at him for RoboCop was untrue, there is still the matter of Crowe being in talks for Darren Aronofsky’s Noah and Akiva Goldsman’s adaptation of the Mark Helperin novel Winter’s Tale. He’s also playing Inspector Javert in Tom Hooper’s Les Miserables.
And now Crowe is also reportedly in talks with Warner Bros. to take a starring role in Harker, the Dracula retelling that Jaume Collet-Serra (Orphan) is developing to direct. Read More »
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This is starting to get ridiculous. Yesterday we heard that Akiva Goldsman is still trying to call in favors with Russell Crowe, among other actors, to play a role in his directorial debut Winter’s Tale. Then it came out that Darren Aronofsky wants the actor for Noah. Now MGM is supposedly looking at Crowe for RoboCop. Really? Read More »
We’ll probably never see Russell Crowe in a sequel to Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, but what about having Crowe play the commander of another ship in another epic adventure film? How about if he was the commander of the ship — by which I mean Noah, and his ark. And then throw in Liam Neeson in another major role, under the direction of Darren Aronofsky. That’s how the cast of Aronofsky’s long-gestating Noah is starting to take shape. Read More »
Posted on Wednesday, February 1st, 2012 by Angie Han
Though Akiva Goldsman has been behind some of Hollywood’s biggest hits of the ’90s and ’00s as a screenwriter and a producer, it’s only now that he’s gearing up to make his directorial debut. For the past few years, he’s been trying to get together an adaptation of Mark Helprin‘s magical realism novel Winter’s Tale, and he finally got the green light from Warner Bros. last year. Now the project is taking another big step forward, as two huge names enter talks to star: Russell Crowe and Will Smith. More after the jump.
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Posted on Wednesday, February 1st, 2012 by Angie Han
After months of speculation, rumors, and reports, Tom Hooper‘s Les Misérables has finally found its Éponine. Producer Cameron Mackintosh has just announced that 21-year-old stage vet Samantha Barks has landed the role. Barks is a newcomer when it comes to film and television, but has racked up plenty of experience in the theater — including a stint playing Éponine in a London production of Les Misérables.
Meanwhile, another fresh face, George Blagden, has also boarded the project, in the part of cynical young revolutionary Grantaire. Blagden and Barks join a high-profile cast that includes Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, Eddie Redmayne, Amanda Seyfried, Sacha Baron Cohen, Helena Bonham Carter, and Aaron Tveit. Read more after the jump.
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Posted on Wednesday, January 4th, 2012 by Angie Han
[Update: Deadline now reports that Seyfried is in final negotiations for the role.]
Tom Hooper‘s already star-studded cast for Les Misérables is about to expand by two more, as news breaks that Amanda Seyfried and Taylor Swift have been offered the roles of Cosette and Éponine, respectively. If Seyfried and Swift accept, they’ll also be joining Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen, Aaron Tveit, and Eddie Redmayne in the musical, which is due out next winter. Read more after the jump.
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Posted on Thursday, December 29th, 2011 by Angie Han
That Tony Award-winning Broadway vet Hugh Jackman was a great pick to star as Jean Valjean Tom Hooper‘s Les Misérables was never in doubt, but it seems his theater experience may prove even more helpful to the film production than we previously expected. According to a new report, Hooper has ordered his cast to sing live while shooting their scenes, much as they would if they were performing in a stage musical.
The more usual method is to record the vocals in a studio and lip-synch during filming, so Hooper’s decision suggests that we may be seeing something more traditionally theatrical than we’re used to seeing from big-screen musicals. Read more after the jump.
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Looks like Paul Haggis and Russell Crowe aren’t going to revive ’80s TV show The Equalizer, after all. Last year Haggis was in talks to write a big-screen version of the show that starred Edward Woodward as a retired secret agent who tries to atone for his violent past by offering his services, pro bono, to those in need. The film also had Crowe attached to play the lead role, and it was easy to guess how he’d work out in the role originated by Woodward.
But things change, and in the year since we last heard about the project both Haggis and Crowe have evidently moved on. Today Sony released a statement about the company’s continuing first-look deal with production company Escape Artists. The release runs down several in-development projects, one of which is The Equalizer. It says that the film is being developed as a starring vehicle for Denzel Washington. Read More »
