Skyfall and Casino Royale helped usher in such a vastly new appreciation for the James Bond franchise that with Sam Mendes returning to direct the still untitled Bond 24 and rumored to direct Bond 25, excitement remains high for any new details about the project. And though Daniel Craig has been much less the casanova since Eva Green in Casino Royale, you can’t have a Bond movie without a Bond girl.
Now The Daily Mail has confirmed that Lea Seydoux, the French actress from Blue is the Warmest Color, The Grand Budapest Hotel and Midnight in Paris, has been cast as a “femme fatale” in Mendes’s film. That’s not explicitly clear that she’ll be the female lead or that she will be the “Bond Girl” so to speak, but she does join a cast that also includes Craig, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw, and Naomi Harris.
According to The Daily Mail, shooting is scheduled to begin in six weeks, and the film has currently locked in a November 6, 2015 release date. The Mail also claims that the story will have an Italian connection and once originally called for a Scandinavian actress.
In other casting news, Jennifer Jason Leigh is joining the cast of Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight, The Wrap reports. She’ll be taking the role of Daisy Domergue, who was portrayed by Amber Tamblyn in a live reading of the script. The Wrap says that Jason Leigh will likely join Michael Madsen, Tim Roth, Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Bruce Dern and more, although the complete cast has not yet been confirmed. The Hateful Eight will start shooting next year and aim for a release in 2015, but then you know Tarantino.
NBC this week finalized a deal on a TV series based on the 1989 romance classic Say Anything…, but after a stern objection from Director Cameron Crowe to Producer Aaron Kaplan directly and on Twitter, NBC has nixed the project altogether. Deadline first reported the news that the show would be a single camera comedy produced by Kaplan and written by Better Off Ted‘s Justin Adler, but within 24 hours the tides had shifted. Deadline then followed up that announcement with details that NBC could have legally proceeded had they wished to, that they had tried to bring Crowe into the project, and that Crowe was open to revisiting past projects, but was now opposed because this was made without his knowledge or involvement.
Roger Ebert, being the Internet savant that he was, was an avid editor of Wikipedia, often linking to his own work and providing insightful wit and information to what became boilerplate encyclopedia entries. Under the moniker “Rebert“, an artist has compiled all of Ebert’s edits into a short book. Unfortunately, he’s made only one copy, and it’s not available for sale. Ebert edited 18 Wikipedia entries in all up until 2009. The Atlantic has details of the artist’s observations and passages from Ebert’s edits, all of which are still freely cataloged on Wikipedia.
Also making news:
- Samples of the Amazing Amy books mentioned in Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl are now available for download in the iTunes bookstore
- Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant are lining up for a Stephen Frears opera movie about a performer who famously could not sing
- Steve Carell is continuing to extend his dramatic range with a “paranoid thriller” directed by Gore Verbinski and written by Steve Conrad (The Secret Life of Walter Mitty)
- Casey Affleck will produce and star in a film based on the book “Boston Strong”, which chronicled the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings
- ABC is developing a series based on the John Candy character and film Uncle Buck