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Posts with tag kristen smith

Katherine Heigl Dishes 'The Ugly Truth'

Filed under: Comedy », Romance », Casting », Sony », Newsstand »

Earlier this year, in Knocked Up, Katherine Heigl played a television personality for E! But her character started out in a behind-the-camera role, despite the fact that she's a knock-out beauty. Now, according to Variety, the actress has been cast in a similar part. She'll play an off-screen producer of a morning show, who also happens to be "romantically challenged," in the romantic comedy The Ugly Truth, in which she must deal with a "chauvinistic" correspondent attempting to teach her how to find love. Here's where the plot description makes little sense: "His clever ploys, however, lead to an unexpected result." Unexpected? I think we all can easily predict and expect the result as being that Heigl's character falls for the correspondent. Anyone who has ever seen a screwball romantic comedy can see that one coming a mile away. When is Hollywood going to just own up to the fact that they use genre conventions and that we in the audience enjoy genre conventions (and have enjoyed them for a century now) and leave out the "unexpected" crap? Who do they think they're kidding?

The sad thing is that this not only sounds like another genre picture; it actually sounds more like the plot of Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy. But fans of that movie may not be interested in The Ugly Truth, which is being made by the collaborative team behind Legally Blonde. The script was written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kristen Smith, who last gave us She's the Man (which I'm still not ashamed to admit I enjoyed), and it will be directed by Robert Luketic, whose last movie was Monster-in-Law (which I'm still not ashamed to admit I would never ever watch). Filming is set to begin mid-April. All we need now is a hot, irresistible, but believably chauvinistic actor to play the obvious love interest.

Anna Faris Will Do Playboy

Filed under: Comedy », Casting », Newsstand »

Calm down there guys, her career hasn't tanked enough for Anna Faris to begin entertaining the same ideas you were entertaining after reading the title of this post. Nope, instead, Faris will star in an untitled college campus comedy for Columbia Pictures and Happy Madison. And, in the pic, she'll play an ex-Playboy bunny who packs her bags and moves into the lamest sorority house on campus in an attempt to make this group of girl nerds more popular. I imagine it will be something like Ferris Bueller meets Revenge of the Nerds ... except with females. Perhaps we can call it Van Wilder 3: The One Where Anna Faris Shows Up to Deliver One or Two Laughs?

Penned by Legally Blonde (and She's the Man, and Ella Enchanted, and ... do you a spot a theme yet?) scribes Karen McCullah Lutz and Kristen Smith, pic looks to be another female-centric fish-out-of-water comedy and should fit right in alongside Lutz and Smith's other films. Granted, it doesn't appear to be the most mouth-watering concept, but I can see it having potential. Lutz and Smith know how to write entertaining comedy for a mass audience, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't the least bit interested in a Revenge of the Nerds-type reversal. Only problem is can they find a group of Hollywood actresses who can play "lame?" We already know there's plenty of dorky guys out there, but there aren't many recent films that feature an abundance of nerd-ish girls. Who would you cast? (Here's where someone will inevitably say, "Well, they already cast their first lame actress -- Anna Faris!")

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