Goodbye, Matt Dillon! Hellloooo Adrien Brody! I don't know what happened since October, when Matt Dillon was in final negotiations to star, but Cadillac Records has found itself a new leading man. Variety reports that The Pianist, Adrien Brody, has signed on to star along with Jeffrey Wright, the insanely wonderful actor from Basquiat, in the upcoming film. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't mind Matt Dillon, but this project just went from good to great in my books. Brody would've been enough, but with Wright? No one could keep me away.

Adrien has taken on the role of Leonard Chess, and Wright will be Muddy Waters in the feature, which starts filming in March. They will be joined by Columbus Short (Stomp the Yard), Emmanuelle Chriqui (Entourage), Cedric the Entertainer (Code Name: The Cleaner), and Tammy Blanchard (Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows). I'm neither here nor there on the supporting cast, but I'm sort of hoping Joe Morton pops up in a role. Should he, I think I will pass out from movie fan heaven. But anyway...

Coming from writer/director Darnell Martin, Cadillac Records dips into the Chicago music scene of the 1950s -- "charting the colorful lives of American musical legends like Waters, Chess, Little Walter, Howlin' Wolf, and Elvis Presley." There's no word on who will play the rest of the greats yet, but we should find out soon, before production begins in New Jersey and Mississippi this spring.

It's funny how you can get completely used to seeing a name, and then used to its absence, only to have it pop up again, years later, out of nowhere. Skeet Ulrich has been steering clear of the big screen (or the big screen has been steering clear of him) for a while now. The last time he had a movie out, it was the 2001 flick Chilly Dogs. There was also Soul Assassin, Nobody's Baby, and Takedown -- which was a Hackers sequel that somehow flew off the radar even with a jam-packed cast. But now things are changing for the Jericho star. He's got a new movie on the way, and maybe this will be his reintroduction to the wide world of film.

The Hollywood Reporter has posted that he has nabbed a role in the upcoming flick, Armored. This is that Matt Dillon gang of thieves movie that Peter Martin blogged about back in October -- the one that also has Columbus Short attached. Ulrich is taking on the role of Dobbs -- "a scruffy member of an armored truck company who plans to empty a truck of its $10 million." The thieves all somehow got themselves the armored car gig, so there's one HR person somewhere who is really, really crappy at their job . Sweetening the pot, I hope as thieves -- THR says that Laurence Fishburne, Fred Ward, and the best Professional to ever hit the screen, Jean Reno, will co-star.

Some things never change while others come and go, but no matter what happens, it's a comfort to hear that Skeet can still grab a scruffy role.

Maybe it's because I just sat through the lazy, depressing Fred Claus. Maybe it's because I was expecting Tyler Perry in drag. Maybe it's because my holiday spirit is at an all-time low. Whatever the reason, This Christmas came as a complete surprise. I kinda loved the thing.

Loretta Devine plays Ma Dear, the matriarch of a sprawling Los Angeles-based family with a whole lot of secrets. A whole lot. There's Quentin (Idris Elba, Stringer Bell on The Wire -- the best show on television), a musician who owes big money to some bookies. There's Lisa (Regina King), trapped in an emotionally abusive marriage with the hissable Malcome (Laz Alonso). There's Kelli (Sharon Leal), a sexually frustrated businesswoman. There's Claude (Columbus Short), in love with a woman (Jessica Stroup) he's scared to introduce to his family. Ma Dear has a secret of her own regarding Joe (Delroy Lindo), something of a surrogate father to the Whitfield clan. Oh, and Baby (R&B sensation Chris Brown)? He wants to sing, damn it!

That's a lot of stories to keep afloat, and writer/director Preston A. Whitmore II handles that list and many more mini-dramas with ease. It's quite the balancing act. Whitmore has written and/or directed several smaller projects since 1995's Vietnam drama The Walking Dead, but Christmas will put him on the map in a big way.

When you become an actor and star, there's lots of tricky scenarios to contend with. Beyond all the losses of privacy, you really have to watch what you talk about. There's all sorts of embargoes by the studio to keep actors from spilling secret details; there is the challenge of answering questions and being charming without giving away too much personal information; and finally -- there's the challenge of not saying something that could be taken the wrong way and erupt across the lines of news and blog feeds out there.

Columbus Short, star of Stomp the Yard, was recently asked about the turmoil that is Britney Spears. For those not familiar with the particulars of Ms. Spears' work, Short used to be her tour choreographer, and he whipped up her dance moves for her "In the Zone" tour. So, according to Jam!, he was recently asked about her troubles. His response: I really don't have any thoughts. I think we need to just stop talking about it and then she'll die... (horrified pause). Um, not literally. That's not what I meant. I meant she'll start to heal. Uh, next question?

Whoops! I see how he could confuse dying and healing, can't you? Talk about a big blunder. I have this feeling that he won't be commenting on other people and their issues in the future. Otherwise, he might have to be Quarantined from more than just a building full of rabies. Looking on the bright side, at least it was brunt-of-the-joke Britney. If he had let some important movie news slip, he might be finding himself back on the concert circuit.

You always have to beware of the rabies. It brought down Old Yeller, and it can bring down hot, fresh, Hollywood talent. The Hollywood Reporter has posted that Hostel star Jay Hernandez, Dexter's wacky sister Jennifer Carpenter, and Columbus Short (Stomp the Yard), along with Splendor's Johnathon Schaech and Steve Harris (Diary of a Mad Black Woman), will be rabidly Quarantined. The flick is an adaptation of the Spanish horror movie Rec, and the kicker: the flipping original film hasn't even come out yet! That's right -- the English-language version has already been cast and goes into production today, while the original doesn't hit European screens until November 23.

The adaptation was written by director John Erick Dowdle with his brother Drew Dowdle, whose previous collaboration was this year's horror/thriller, The Poughkeepsie Tapes. This version of Quarantined is about an apartment building in downtown Los Angeles "where a deadly strain of rabies breaks out. A reporter and her cameraman are among those trapped inside when the edifice and its residents are quarantined." That's got to suck. However, maybe it's better than being quarantined with some skin-rotting virus or something. At least you have a fighting chance against rabid people. I have a feeling that some of the footage will be from the wobbly, running hand of the cameraman, but we'll have to wait and see, since we can't even watch the original yet.

Is Hollywood speeding up adaptations too much?

Since his Academy Award-nominated turn as a racist cop in Crash, the ever-reliable Matt Dillon has starred as Charles Bukowski's alter-ego in the drama Factotum and played a hapless husband in the disappointing You, Me and Dupree. He also appeared recently in supporting roles in Kevin Bacon's drama Loverboy and opposite Lindsay Lohan in the family comedy Herbie: Fully Loaded. That selection of parts has been typical throughout Dillon's career, as he's moved easily between the independent and studio worlds and is equally at home in both comedies and dramas.

Now The Hollywood Reporter says that he's in final negotiations for two more roles, both crime-related. Dillon will play a detective who intercepts the plans of a group of bank robbers in Bone Deep. The article doesn't say whether Dillon is working for the police or on his own, only that the robbers are trying to pull off a $20 million heist. John Luessenhop is set to direct; he previously made the prison drama Lockdown. I'm hoping Bone Deep will give Dillon a chance to play a sleazy detective, possibly related to his sleazy high school teacher in Wild Things. Few people combine sleaze and charm like Dillon.

Armored features another gang of thieves, this time "armored car guards who plan to empty their truck of $10 million," according to THR. Hmm, does that mean they're more modest than the thieves in Bone Deep? Will the two gangs run into each other while they're trying to get away? No word on what part Dillon would play, but Columbus Short, who just turned down The Green Lantern, will co-star. Nimród Antal (the excellent Kontroll and the surprising Vacancy) will direct. Before those films come out, we can anticipate Dillon in Old Dogs, Nothing But the Truth and Cadillac Records.

I'm not sure how many actors need to turn down roles in the upcoming Justice League of America movie before they just to tuck their movie production tail between their legs and run away. Man, they've got to be close. Jessica Biel's turned down Wonder Woman, and they're really having a heck of a time finding interested actors. MTV now reports that Stomp the Yard's Columbus Short, who has got This Christmas and Whiteout on the way, is among those who have turned down the chance.

The actor told the site he was up for the movie, having been approached to take on John Stewart/The Green Lantern. But he didn't refuse out of comic disgust. Short says: "Justice League is going to be dope; it's going to be huge. But it's not the movie for me." While he used to be set on becoming the first really big African-American feature film superhero, now he says: "I think there comes a point in an actor's career when he decides what type of actor you want to be. [Each actor] decides: I want to do commercial movies, but do I want to go this way? Or do I want to go that way?" Apparently, he didn't want to don tights and take that route.

The cynic in me wonders if he's just being nice, and would be interested in the role, or a similar superhero role, if it wasn't such a rush-job movie. Whatever the case, he's out, and JLA is back to square one. Will anyone want to be in this thing? Is this a lost cause?

Here is your next interracial action buddy duo: Channing Tatum and Columbus Short. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the two young actors have been cast in an untitled movie for Columbia Pictures, and as usual the plot is being kept a secret. However, I'm sure you can guess the basic premise -- white guy and black guy are partnered against their will in order to thwart some type of crime, perhaps? They could be cops, they could be cons, they could be anything as long as they hate each other at first and then learn to work well together by film's end. Hopefully they aren't an ice cream man and a convenience store clerk, though, because we all know how the careers of Skeet Ulrich and Cuba Gooding Jr. went following the release of Chill Factor. The script for Tatum and Short's film was written by David Elliot and Paul Lovett, who worked together on Four Brothers. Neal Moritz, who gave us the buddy action pic Blue Streak, as well as the Fast and the Furious trilogy, is producing.

I'm excited about the possibility of this movie furthering Tatum's rise as a star. The first thing I saw him in was actuallly She's the Man, and I immediately recognized a talent not usually present in the guys cast as the love interest for that kind of movie -- pretty boys like Oliver James (What a Girl Wants; Raise Your Voice), Chad Michael Murray (Freaky Friday; A Cinderella Story), Jonathan Bennett (Mean Girls) and Matt Long (Sydney White) are a dime a dozen, and acting range isn't a job requirement. Next I saw Tatum in A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, and I was completely sold on his possible future in Hollywood. For much of America, though, it was Step Up, which I haven't seen, that made him a familiar face. Coming up, the guy has at least two high profile movies set for release by early 2008 and he's got 4 projects in development, including a Step Up sequel.

As for Short, well, I must admit I haven't really seen him in anything. He and Tatum both appeared in War of the Worlds, but each was in a bit part and I certainly don't recognize him from that. Films he's starred in that you might have seen include Accepted, Stomp the Yard and Save the Last Dance 2. This fall he appears in This Christmas and next year he'll be seen opposite Kate Beckinsdale in Whiteout.

I must say, I hate when you get a cast list of newly-signed actors, and only some of the roles are described. That being said, I'm going to take assumption and run with it. In February, I confirmed Ryan's post that Kate Beckinsale was gearing up for Dominic Sena's upcoming, and quite literally chilling thriller, Whiteout. With Beckinsale signed on to play Carrie Stetko, the woman rushing to find a killer before winter strikes Antarctica, Variety reports that the other cast is slowly falling into place.

First, we've got Columbus Short. Star of Stomp the Yard and the upcoming The Great Debaters, Short will play Lt. Delfy, according to IMDb. Then there is modelizer-turned-Because I Said So love interest, Gabriel Macht. He's playing a U.N. operative who is investigating the murder with Beckinsale. And then... Then, there is Tom Skerritt. There is no word on who he's playing, so my over-active and hopeful imagination is crossing its metaphorical fingers that Skerritt will play the deranged killer, although I fear that he'll be playing some stodgy man in charge. Please, powers-that-be. The man from Ice Castles, The Dead Zone and Poison Ivy deserves a great part!

There's some news I am still trying to process before writing it up, so in the interim, I give you news bits:

• It's time for a little more news on Denzel Washington's upcoming The Great Debaters. We've covered the film briefly before, when there were Jackson possibilities and Weinstein money. The period feature is about African American poet, Mel Tolson, and his creation of Wiley College's first debating team, which went on to defeat Harvard in the national championships. Washington has stepped up, not surprisingly, to play Tolson, and Stomp the Yard's Columbus Short is in negotiations to play one of the students. This film should also prove to be a breath of fresh air from the usual hoodlum-turned-scholar fare -- Production Weekly reports that one of the debaters was a 14-year-old freshman whose father was the first Negro Ph.D in Texas.
• In January, Erik reported that Rachael Taylor had signed on for the Shutter remake. Now we've got a veritable poo-poo platter of television testosterone to round out the cast. First there is the Dawson's Creek heartthrob who has been fading into the background since his stint as Pacey ended, Joshua Jackson, who co-stars with Taylor as her new husband. Next comes David Denman who not only plays Roy on The Office, but also played the big, secretive monster Skip on Angel. You can throw a little Nip/Tuck to the mix with John Hensley, who plays Matt McNamara. And finally, there is James Kyson Lee, who plays Hiro's sidekick, Ando, on Heroes.
• The BBC has just released an article about the future of technology, as told from a survey produced by the South Korean government. Sure, there are musings about cell phone batteries that last a month, robot surgeons, and other zany ideas, but they also muse that by 2015, we'll have fragrance catridges in our computer. Sure, it's been talked about before, but just think about it -- John Water's smellovision with everything! Perhaps the director would then add smells to everything, although I think some certain, infamous, Divine scenes should remain smell-free. [via Film Ick]