Trade Round-Up: The Keanu-"Snakes on a Plane" Connection

· Hollywood still fascinated with Hollywood: Christopher Guest shifts from mockumentary to a movie about making a bad indie movie that attracts awards buzz in For Your Consideration, and adds Ricky Gervais to his regular cast. [Variety]
· Keanu Reeves and CZJ are "circling" Lana-Turner-dead-boyfriend movie Stompanato. We note this only because a writer of Snakes on a Plane is involved in the project. [THR]
· Sony to pay Blackhawk Down writer Ken Nolan $3 million for a "script-ment" (longer than a treatment, not quite a script) of as-yet-unpublished alien sci-fi novel The Grays. Tomorrow, Sony hopes to announce a $2 million option of a rough crayon sketch of Will Smith shooting a stick figure on a CPK placemat. [Variety]
· Milos Forman will direct Natalie Portman and Javier Bardem in a biopic about Spanish painter Francisco de Goya. Will this project prove arty enough for Portman to finally go topless? Remember, that movie about Frida Kahlo finally got Salma Hayek to loosen up, even though we had to compromise on the eyebrows and mustache. [THR]
· NBC Universal Television Studios (NUTS) showers the Weitz Brothers in the cash of desperation, signing them to a two-year television deal potentially worth $4 million. [Variety]