The View: DreamWorks is in discussions with producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci to work a little bit of their “Transformers-style magic†(those are The Hollywood Reporter’s words, not ours) on the View-Master, that toy with the stereoscopic discs and the clicking, which children once used to look at pictures of mountains and zoo animals prior to the invention of Internet pornography. Brad Caleb Kane (Fringe) will write script (“It’ll be like the old ‘80s Amblin movies: Goonies, Young Sherlock … in that vein,†he said in a recent tweet), though no plot details have yet been revealed. What could possibly go wrong? [THR]
Well Done: Zach Galifianakis’s name is being kicked around in connection with three movies: Due Date, about a slacker who hits the road with an uptight businessman, and Say Uncle, both from Todd Philips; and Man-Witch, which had Jack Black attached at one point, about a man who discovers he has supernatural powers and subsequently attends an all-girls witch school. There is no attachment from Galifianakis, but the movies are currently floating around Hollywood with his name in order to attract other cast members. Ladies and gentleman, Zach Galifianakis is on the A-list. [THR]
Remake-a-thon: It won’t ever, ever stop: Baywatch, originally purchased by DreamWorks in 2005, is back on the big-screen track at Paramount. Jeremy Garelick, who most recently did an uncredited rewrite of The Hangover, has been brought onboard; he’s shaping it up as a broad comedy in the vein of Police Academy, with the plot centering on two regular-Joe lifeguard candidates trying to make it alongside all the sexy vets. That, surprisingly, does not sound terrible. But, for the record, if they remake Pacific Blue, we’re quitting life. [Variety]
Stuck in the Middle: In more-heartening adaptation news: HBO is producing a one-hour drama based on Jeffrey Eugenides’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel Middlesex, which centers on the family history and complicated identity of Calliope Stephanides. Donald Margulies, who will write the adaptation, has a Pulitzer of his own, for his 2000 play Dinner With Friends. Rita Wilson, who will executive produce, does not have a Pulitzer, but can boast of the next best thing: a crucial supporting role in Runaway Bride. [Variety]
Beauty and. ..: Peter Krause has joined the cast of Beastly as the materialistic father of a popular teen (Alex Pettyfer) who plays a cruel joke on a secret-witch classmate (Mary-Kate Olsen) and is then transformed into a monster of some kind. Krause, a veteran television actor, will surely get the respect he so richly deserves when he shares the screen with an Olsen twin. [Variety]
Mackie Onstage: Anthony Mackie has joined The Bacchae, the Shakespeare in the Park production that will follow Anne Hathaway’s Twelfth Night. Mackie will play Pentheus, the king punished for his refusal to worship Dionysus. Seeing as Dionysus is pretty much the god of partying, it sounds like Pentheus is totally the king of Bummertown. [Variety]
All Alone: Beau Bridges has joined the indie thriller Columbus Circle. The movie stars Selma Blair as a reclusive heiress who hasn’t left her fancy Manhattan apartment in nearly twenty years; her world is shaken up when a detective (Giovanni Ribisi) comes to investigate a homicide next door and a couple (Jason Lee and Amy Smart) move in. Bridges plays Dr. Raymond Fontaine, one of the few people Blair’s character communicates with. [THR]