The Rising Hotness of Taylor Kitsch
His hotness — career hotness — is definitely, um, hottening up. Also today: Harrison Ford will never tire of killing aliens, a new Laura Dern series excites, a new William H. Macy series exhausts (for some reason), and Twilight!
Some good news! HBO has picked up a new series from lovely weirdo Mike White, starring the transcendent Laura Dern. Enlightened is about a woman, Dern, who has some kind of revelation and decides to pursue an enlightened existence. This starts to make things weird at home. Luke Wilson and Dern's mom Diane Ladd are also in the cast. Exciting. [THR]
Grizzled old hero of Corellia Harrison Ford may join the cast of the upcoming Western/sci-fi actioner Cowboys & Aliens. Jon Favreau, the director, announced it on Twitter! Sadly these days it's unclear whether Ford would play a cowboy, or an alien. (Kidding. He'd play a cowboy.) And yes, the movie is about exactly what it sounds like it's about. [Variety]
The upcoming swoony Italian weeper Letters to Juliet, starring potential superstar Amanda Seyfried and the blonde boy from Kings, is facing a spot of legal trouble. A small production company is suing the movie's studio, Summit Entertainment, claiming that they own the exclusive rights to the real-life group that answers Juliet's letters that the movie is sort of based on. (Yeah, that's what it's about. It takes place in Verona, at least partly. And costars Vanessa Redgrave. The universe ever expands.) Summit says it's baseless and they will probably win because they are big(ger) and rich and that's that. [TheWrap]
Taylor Kitsch, the not-at-all attractive in any way star of Friday Night Lights, is continuing his burgeoning action/adventure movie career. He's currently filming John Carter of Mars (starring Harrison Ford as Mars) and has now signed on to play the lead in Battleship, FNL creator Peter Berg's adaptation of the children's game. (He added aliens to the story, so we expect Harrison Ford to announce his role sometime shortly.) Interestingly, Jeremy Renner had been up for the same part, but decided to do Paul Thomas Anderson's new movie instead. He chose... wisely. [THR]
Remember when the final two Twilight movies (the fourth book, Breaking Dawn, is being broken up into two movies, because there's just so much story) were looking for a director and they were like "Hey Gus Van Sant, wanna do it?" Well, no, Gus Van Sant does not wanna do it. Now they've turned their attention to bigtime gaylord DreamGirls director Bill Condon (well, OK, so he directed Kinsey and Gods & Monsters and the Candyman sequel too). Interesting! Hopefully there will be a sparklevamp musical number in which pretty, pretty fan-of-sucking Edward von Cullen does a shimmerdance and Bella stands upstage right giving him shooo-bop backup. That happens in the book, right? [EW]
Rising comedian Aziz Ansari (Parks & Recreation) is negotiating his way onto the movie 30 Minutes or Less, one of those coveted Black List scripts that's going to be directed by Zombieland hotshot Ruben Fleischer. It's an action comedy about two dudes who get forced to rob a bank or something and probably say "Oh shit!" a lot. Sounds like Ansari's alley, no? [THR]
Showtime has ordered a new Brit-to-American import, Shameless, to series. Starring William H. Macy as a drunk and Emmy Rossum as his annoying, precocious (one assumes with her) daughter, the series was adapted to American English by John Wells. It's billed as a sprawling ensemble show, though Macy is something of the anchor. So they're kind of combining their shows about wicked men (Tudors, Brotherhood, Dexter) with their shows about women with problems (Tara, Jackie, The Big C). Smoosh! [Variety]