Shia LaYalie: Shia LaBeouf and Paramount are teaming up again for the film adaptation of John Grisham’s The Associate, which isn’t even out yet. Due in January, the book focuses on a student (the Beef) who’s about to graduate from Yale Law School when he’s manipulated into accepting a job at a prestigious law firm, presumably by huge robots. [Variety]
Before the Battle: The Sci Fi Channel has given the green light to Caprica, the Battlestar Galactica prequel you’ve been waiting for. Set to star Eric Stoltz and Esai Morales, the show will be set 50 years before the Cylons attack the human race and focus on how the people of the Caprica deal with emerging artificial intelligence. “I think, because (Galactica’s) backdrop was space and spaceships, there was a barrier to entry for some viewers. Caprica has none of that. It’s an intense family drama set on an Earthlike planet…†said Sci Fi president Dave Howe. So why isn’t this show airing on Sci Fi’s sister network, the Boring Earthlike Stuff Channel? [Variety]
Funny Guys: Overture Films has inked a deal with Peter Farrelly and Charles Wessler to produce an untitled feature project that will be made up of as many as 24 comedy shorts. Farrelly will direct two of the shorts himself, and talks are ongoing with Brett Ratner, Todd Phillips and Mike Judge to write-direct segments. Given the early looks of this one, we’ll go ahead and bet that the number of female writer-directors in this is under one. Any takers? [HR]
Child Stew: According to producer Alfonso Cuarón, Guillermo del Toro has a creepy script ready for their adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Witches. Del Toro’s also planning on amping up the creep factor by shooting the whole film in stop-motion animation. The story centers on a cadre of evil witches, intent of ridding the world of children, and it’s all part of Del Toro’s plan to break the record set by Where the Wild Things Are for highest number of crying children at a test screening. [Empire]
Stevenson Gets Booked: Ray Stevenson has joined the cast of Denzel Washington–led action-drama The Book of Eli. Stevenson, best known as the Punisher, will play a tough guy sent to kill Eli (Washington) as he fights his way across America, protecting a sacred book that holds the key to saving human kind. Spoiler alert: The sacred book is the unreleased eighth Harry Potter. [Variety]
News Flash: Courtney B. Vance and Jack Davenport are the first actors to sign on to ABC’s pilot Flash Forward, rumored to be similar to Lost. The show is based on a sci-fi novel and chronicles the worldwide chaos that happens when the world’s entire population “blacks out for 2 minutes and 17 seconds and has a mysterious vision of the future that changes lives forever.†Vance plays the Los Angeles chief of the FBI, and Davenport plays a father searching for his son. Remember to pay close attention to this one. You can get some tips for when the Hadron Collider sucks us all into a black hole. [HR]