Serena: A Film?: Angelina Jolie and Darren Aronofsky (The Wrestler) are in talks to develop a film adaptation of the 2008 book Serena: A Novel, written by Ron Rash. Jolie would star in the Aronofsky-helmed picture, which centers on a man named George and his wife, Serena, who build a timber empire. Serena pushes her husband along an increasingly corrupt path, and — after she learns she can’t bear a child for George — she sets out to kill the son he fathered illegitimately … with Jennifer Aniston. Just kidding, everyone knows Jennifer Aniston is lonely and barren! [HR]
Four More Go Orange: An indie-film dream quartet of Adam Brody, Catherine Keener, Allison Janney, and Alia Shawkat (Arrested Development) is in talks to join the cast of the family dramedy The Oranges, which will star House’s Hugh Laurie and Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester. The film, which will begin filming in New York City at the end of March, focuses on a man (Laurie) who begins an affair with the daughter (Meester) of a family friend. Shawkat and Keener would play Laurie’s daughter and wife, respectively, and Janney would be Meester’s mom. Brody would take on the part of Laurie’s son, who falls hard for Meester only to find out she’s sleeping with his dad … which makes us think about Summer and Sandy Cohen having an affair … which is not pleasant. [HR]
Heard Set to Drive: Amber Heard (Zombieland, The Stepfather) has joined the Nicolas Cage 3-D action movie Drive Angry, in which a man (Cage) “driven by rage†chases down the people who killed his daughter and abducted her baby. Heard will play the diner employee who teams up with Cage to help find his granddaughter. We pray that “partners in crime-fighting†is the extent of their relationship, but we fear otherwise. [HR]
Fox Hopes for Franchise: Fox 2000 has won the rights to Incarceron, British author Catherine Fisher’s young-adult novel, in the hopes of building a franchise from the New York Times best-selling book. Incarceron tells the story of a boy who lives in a prison “that is a complete society,†while the world outside is “stuck in the seventeenth century and run by computers.†The boy meets the warden’s daughter, “who lives in her own sort of jail,†and they find a “key that can change everything.†Um, there seem to be some sexual metaphors going on here that we just aren’t quite getting. [Variety]
Life After Tuck: Nip/Tuck’s Dylan Walsh and Joely Richardson have each scored leads in pilots this season. Richardson will play a successful New York prosecutor in Jerry Bruckheimer’s The Whole Truth for ABC. Walsh will star in CBS’s ATF, playing an ATF agent who tracks down dangerous criminals while being a good dad to a daughter who has reentered his life. These premises promise to be unlike anything you have ever seen on TV! [HR]