ChaceCrawford Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The biggest enemy of the Footloose remake isn't a music-hating preacher, but its own Creative Differences. After it finally recovered from the loss of Zac Efron by recruiting Chace Crawford and Julianne Hough, Variety reports that Footloose has now lost its captain. Director Kenny Oretega has left the project due to "differences over tone and budget."

Reportedly, Ortega's vision included elaborate dance sequences and a budget of $30 million or more. But Paramount's Adam Goodwin had something different in mind. He saw Footloose with a little less dancing, a little less music, and a lot more edge. He was also hoping the budget would come in around $25 million. Who is right? I don't know. If you want something closer to the original, I'd say Goodwin is spot on. Kevin Bacon did his lithe dance moves in barns and car washes. It was on the cheap. It was also pretty edgy (relatively speaking) in its handling of teenage sexuality. Is any remake going to feature its heroine yelling "I'm not even a virgin!" in the middle of a church? Nah. They'll just dress her sexy.

Paramount is now on the hunt for a new director in order to kick off its Sunday shoes and begin filming by 2010. I was going to say "Maybe this'll be the end of this silly remake" but there's no way that'll happen. Instead, I vote that this Footloose be made with two simultaneous storylines. As they tell the story of the repressive Midwest, we'll also learn about the behind the scenes drama that mirrors the onstage action. Will Ortega's lush vision of music and dance win out? Or will the repressive Goodman crush his freedom of expression? It would be like The French Lieutenant's Woman for high schoolers.

When you can't get Zac Efron to bring Footloose's Ren McCormack into the singing and dancing twenty-first century, who do you get? Do you twist the race? Grab a girl? Get creative and go in an entirely different direction? Naw. You go for the guy who looks the most like the High School Musical star!

Two months after Efron exited from the musical Footloose remake, fearing the woes of a type-casted life, Cinematical has received a press release that reports that the rumors are true -- Gossip Girl's Chace Crawford has nabbed the gig. Along with this casting announcement, Paramount said that no female lead has been picked yet. However, EW sources are throwing around names like Hayden Panettiere and Julianne Hough. Production will begin in March, 2010.

Beyond smooching Blair on GG, Crawford has got a slew of thrillers and horror under his belt, from The Haunting of Molly Hartley to the upcoming Twelve. And now he's moving to the smile-heavy world of musicals, taking on a role that Zac Efron backed out of, and doing so as a look-alike. Am I missing something? I'm going to assume this gig has a huge paycheck, because I can see no other reason Crawford would want to make himself an Efron replacement -- especially when he's already got some solid gigs.

Is the lure of cutting loose really that powerful?

We've already had The Wackness, which dealt with NYC and drug-dealing, but while that had some scary lip-on-lip action, it didn't have a murder twist -- not like this new drug drama. Variety reports that Joel Schumacher is directing Jordan Melamed's adaptation of Nick McDonell's novel Twelve. It's a book that's been compared to both Less Than Zero and Kids, and there's a pretty eclectic cast attached: Chace Crawford, Emma Roberts, Rory Culkin, 50 Cent, Ellen Barkin, and Kiefer Sutherland.

Written in 2002 by a then-17-year-old McDonell, the book follows a high school dropout and drug dealer whose life derails when his cousin is murdered on an East Harlem playground and his best friend is arrested for the crime. So we've got a gritty tale of drugs and affluence, murder, dysfunction, and it'll star a pretty boy from Gossip Girl, the girl who keeps a hotel for dogs, and her Lymelife co-star ... plus a rap star, a woman who started her career with Up in Smoke, and Mr. 24.

I imagine this will be the sort of project that pulls Crawford and Roberts firmly into a different cinematic world, or gently pushes them back to lighter fare. But what's more interesting is what Schumacher will do with this material. He's certainly not the first name that would pop up for this sort of project, but re-teaming with Flatliners and The Lost Boys Sutherland might just be the reinvigoration Schumacher needs. Maybe?

The film hits production soon and is slated for a winter 2010 release.

The Haunting of Molly Hartley isn't bad as far as movie titles go, though it would be a lot better if the movie contained any actual haunting. The girl is plagued by voices that say "Molly!" and "I know what you are!," but is that really a "haunting"? It's more like The Annoying of Molly Hartley or The Messing Around with Molly Hartley's Mind.

At any rate, this lame, tame psychological thriller stars Haley Bennett as Molly, who has just moved with her father (Jake Weber) to a new house and new school after an unsettling incident in which Molly's mother tried to kill her. (Oops!) Mom (Marin Hinkle) is now in the loony bin, which at least reduces the awkwardness around the house, but Molly fears she might be starting to suffer from the same craziness that made her mother go all stabby. She's been having hallucinations both visual and auditory (or "aditory," according to the book she reads; nice work, props department!), and that's cause for concern.

Molly's new school is a fancy prep academy for rich kids, notably Joseph Young (Chace Crawford), who is dreamy and friendly, and Alexis (Shanna Collins), who is friendly and poor. She's there on scholarship and is a pariah for being un-rich, and also for being a devout Christian. (Like most movie Christians, Alexis is portrayed as being humorless, strident, and irrational.) Molly is also befriended by Leah (Shannon Marie Woodward), the Bad Girl who wears fishnet stockings and smokes cigarettes in the bathroom. Joseph's ex-girlfriend, Suzie (AnnaLynne McCord), is the requisite blond Mean Girl. If it weren't for time constraints, I'm sure we'd have been introduced to the Nerd, the Jock, and the Drama Queen, too. You get the idea.