TheBadandUgly.com

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

Ben Stiller To Helm Chicago 7?

Make note of the question mark on the end of the headline, especially considering that the last two headlines we’ve had concerning Aaron Sorkin’s Chi-Town-7 script have been: Paul Greengrass to Direct Chicago 7? and Spielberg Drops All Chicago 7.

And in case you think we’re talking about the Old Chicago specialty pizza, featuring a “conspiracy” of Italian sausage, pepperoni, fresh mushrooms, black olives, green peppers, red onions and Mozzarella cheese, you should CLICK HERE and do some quick Wikipedia-ing…

All previous accounts on this Aaron Sorkin (West Wing) written flick include names like Will Smith, Taye Diggs, Adam Arkin, Kevin Spacey, Sacha Baron Cohen (as Abbie Hoffman) and Philip Seymour Hoffman (as William Kunstler). The film follows the trail of those accused of inciting riots during the 1968 DNC, and you really should Wikipedia it if you know nothing about the actually history.

Steven Speilberg was developing the property at the beginning of this year, but had to ditch out on directing it in favor of his Peter Jackson-partnered TinTin movies and his upcoming historical thriller Lincoln. This summer, ‘round August, Film School Rejects mysteriously found Paul Greengrass listed as the director of the drama in some production literature, sparking several new outlets to speculate that Greengrass was about to be locked into the film.

Now comes news from THR, suggesting that comedy director Ben Stiller (most recently of Tropic Thunder) is in talks to take over the Chicago 7 all-star pic. The nitty gritty involves the recent DreamWorks deal, which saw Spielberg and Co take over production responsibilities on Chi7:

Under terms of the DW-Par separation agreement, DreamWorks has taken over development of the project. The Aaron Sorkin-penned “Chicago,” which was being eyed for a spring ‘08 shoot, is on a very short list of projects that the company wants to put into production quickly.

As for Stiller’s potential involvement, DreamWorks could be eager to keep the hyphenate happy as the company moves into its financing deal with Reliance and hopes to take Stiller production shingle Red Hour Films with it.

So, what do you think? Is Stiller ready to be toilet trained in serious cinema?

We’re willing to give the guy a shot. If you consider what it takes to direct a comedy: timing. Directing a serious film, especially one that has had such an impressive list of actors circling it, can’t be much more difficult. Instead of editing for the punchline or directing large gags with prop cats flying towards one’s face, Stiller would just have to point the camera towards some brilliant actor and let them suss-out a mouth-full of Aaron Sorkin dialogue.

Sounds like an easy gig. Dave’ll direct it if Stiller can’t commit.