One Sean Army: Sean Penn is in negotiations for Universal action flick Cartel, set in the underground world of the Mexican drug trade. The movie — which will be documentarian Asger Leth’s feature directorial debut — revolves around the character of Ed Marker, on a mission to protect his son after his wife is brutally murdered. Spoiler alert: She is brutally murdered by Mexican drug dealers. [Variety]
Leo Going Strong: Melissa Leo’s post-Oscar-nomination buzz continues: She’s the latest actor to join David Simon’s HBO series Treme, as a civil-rights lawyer. The show, about a post-Katrina New Orleans seen through the eyes of local musicians, starts shooting later this month. We assume, in order to fit in with everyone else, Leo’s character is also a trained bassoonist. [Variety]
Ayers on Double Duty: Last Man, a futuristic action movie about a veteran army captain and his inexperienced soldiers doing battle against an alien race on a remote planet, is under development at 20th Century Fox. Promisingly, David Ayers, screenwriter of Training Day, will pen the screenplay. Not so promisingly, David Ayers, director of Street Kings, will also direct. [Variety]
Catherine Zeta-Jones Won’t Be in This One: 2008 documentary The Complete History of My Sexual Failures — in which British filmmaker Chris Waitt explored how his former love interests perceive him — is getting a feature remake courtesy of producers Neal Moritz and Jay Roach; Roach may also direct. The remake will follow a man tracking down every girl he’s dated to ask “What’s wrong with me?†and will alternately be known as the first 45 minutes of High Fidelity. [Variety]
Dumb: A new nadir in reality-television programming approaches: ABC’s April Fool’s special I Get That a Lot will feature a healthy chunk of the nation’s humorless celebrities — including Jessica Simpson, Heidi Klum, Jeff Probst, Ice-T, Mario Lopez, and LeAnn Rimes — as they work regular jobs and try to convince people they are look-alikes. People actually stop Jeff Probst on the street? Really? [Variety]
Scammed: Leighton Meester is in talks for The Roommate, a Screen Gems thriller to be directed by Christian E. Christiansen. In a nod to Single White Female — for our money, the movie with the greatest disparity in its amount-referenced-to-times-actually-seen ratio — Meester’s character’s randomly assigned freshman-year roommate becomes obsessed with her and begins targeting people in her life. [HR]