Here’s the latest casting new coming out of Hollywood…
It’s a big few days for actress Elizabeth Perkins, as it’s been announced that after five years she’s leaving the excellent TV show weeds behind and heading for pastures new. However she’s not just gonna relax, because at the same time as letting it be known it’s the end of her Emmy-nominated run in Weeds, it’s also been revealed she’s joined the cast of I Hop. The film is a tale of an out-of-work slacker (James Marsden) who accidentally injures the son of the Easter Bunny (voiced by Russell Brand) and must take him in as he recovers. Perkins will play Marsden’s exasperated mother. It’ll be the actresses first movie since 2005’s Must Love Dogs. (Source: THR)
Tim Gunn, who previously has mainly been known as the straight-talking, no-nonsense, ‘Make it work’ Project Runway mentor, is trying his hand at acting. The fashion guru has taken a role in The Smurfs Movie, playing an executive assistant at a major cosmetics firm. It’s unlikely to be a major role, and nor is it going to assauge the fears of people who wonder whether the CG/live action movie is just a bad idea. (Source: Variety)
A few months ago it was announced that Hunger director Steve McQueen was planning a biopic about African musician and activist Fela Anikulapo Kuti, who was incredibly popular in the 70s and 80s. However it wasn’t just music where he left his mark as he was alaso very vocal about the opression he saw around him in Nigeria in the 1970s, which resulted in attacks on him and those around him by the government. When he died, over a million people attended his funeral. Now it seems McQueen has found his leading man, with reports that Chiwetel Ejiofor is formally attached to the role of Kuti. Ejoifor was always the obvious choice, because he looks a bit like Kuti, but it’s only now that he’s come oboard. (Source: Deadline)