Trade Round-Up: Naomi Watts Ready To Start Cashing Some Easy Romantic Comedy Paychecks
· Naomi Watts will star in a film adaptation of the book Kicked, Bitten and Scratched: Life and Lessons at the World's Premiere School for Exotic Animal Trainers, which is being developed as a romantic comedy that will inevitably feature much discussion about how men are about as trainable as the average red-assed baboon. [Variety]
· Katt "The Pimp Chronicles" Williams will write and star in and Eddie Murphy will produce and co-star in Marshals, a comedy about the first black marshals in the Old West, for DreamWorks. Both are expected to immediately get to work selecting which bits from Blazing Saddles they'll helpfully "reimagine" for current audiences. [THR]
· Feeling an acute lack of Jenna Elfman in its life since Dharma & Greg went off the air, ABC attempts to fill that empty place by trying to reach a deal for the pilot Literary Superstar, in which Elfman will play an adorably quirky book publicist. [Variety]
· In other ABC pilot casting news involving blonde TV actresses whose careers have cooled, Christina Applegate joins the cast of the comedy Sam I Am, centering on an amensiac's hilarious quest to rediscover her life, a project which we assume will be quickly retitled so as not to be confused with an exploitative sitcom version of Sean Penn's I Am Sam. [THR]
· VH1 Classic spins off some Journey and Whitesnake videos into Rock of Ages, an off-Broadway musical about "a Hollywood rock club circa 1986." [Variety]