Ready to Jump?: Channing Tatum has moved “to the top of the list for the lead of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s 21 Jump Street.†Jonah Hill has long been slated for a role—he also has played a role in shaping the story—in the movie remake of the 1987 Fox television show, which launched the career of Johnny Depp. Apparently Tatum and Hill meshed. The movie will be directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who both did Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs. [Deadline]
Zoology: Patrick Fugit, who played the Cameron Crowe character in Almost Famous, has a secret role in Crowe’s next film, We Bought A Zoo. Matt Damon is already slated to play the lead role of Benjamin Mee, a British man who used his life savings to buy a dilapidated zoo “replete with 200 exotic animals facing destruction,†while Thomas Haden Church will play his brother. Scarlett Johansson is also almost on board. [THR]
Zoology: Patrick Fugit, who played the Cameron Crowe character in Almost Famous, has a secret role in Crowe’s next film, We Bought A Zoo. Matt Damon is already slated to play the lead role of Benjamin Mee, a British man who used his life savings to buy a dilapidated zoo “replete with 200 exotic animals facing destruction,†while Thomas Haden Church will play his brother. Scarlett Johansson is also almost on board. [THR]
Battleship Atlantica: Ronald Moore, who created Battlestar Galactica, sold a drama about “the the men and women of the fictional Coast Guard cutter The McCulloch as they travel around the world.†It will be called The McCulloch. It will not have outer-space aliens. [THR]
Women in Action: Lifetime Television is going to make its first action movie, Close Quarters, about “Abby, a happy suburban wife and mother who has been concealing her dark past as a military-trained special-ops agent.†Catherine Bell of Army Wives will play Abby, Anthony Michael Hall will play her kidnapped husband, and Mekhi Phifer will play a former colleague she served with in Afghanistan. Premium cable vet Ernest Dickerson will direct. [Deadline]