Larry Charles To Direct Jim Carrey Comedy 'Pierre Pierre'

Deadline is reporting that Borat/Bruno helmer Larry Charles has signed on to direct the Jim Carrey comedy Pierre Pierre. This isn't a huge surprise considering the project has always been described as being simular to Bruno/Borat. The story follows a "self-indulgent, lazy, French nihilist who is transporting a stolen Mona Lisa from Paris to London." Through the journey, "he comes to love his home country again." They are hoping to shoot the movie for just over $20 million.

The screenplay ranked the 11th hottest screenplay in Hollywood in the 2008 Black List, an annual poll of 150 development executives and high-level assistants. Fox Searchlight paid close to a million dollars upfront for the screenplay by Edwin Cannistraci & Frederick Seton. Juno/Up in the Air director Jason Reitman was at one time attached to this project. Reitman dropped out, Fox Atomic disolved, and the project fell into turnaround.

Charles started his career as a writer on the television series Fridays, before moving on to become a producer/writer on Seinfeld. An executive producer on Entourage, Charles produced/directed episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm, before making his transition to feature films with the faux documentaries Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan and Brüno and Bill Maher's real documentary Religulous.