Casting News: Bruce Campbell "In" Oz: The Great and Powerful, Benjamin Walker Joins Bradley Cooper in Paradise Lost and More
Posted 08.05.11 by Ryan
In what comes as a surprise to no one, Bruce Campbell will make an appearance in director Sam Raimi's The Wizard of Oz prequel, Oz: The Great and Powerful. Campbell made the announcement himself via his Twitter page.
I. Am. In. Oz. Sam Raimi refuses to tell me what character I will portray. Just know that the role is PIVOTAL.
Campbell included a photo of himself and Raimi from the Evil Dead movies, which is where both the actor and director got their starts. Since then, Campbell has appeared in nearly every movie Raimi has directed since, including cameos in all three Spider-Man movies.
Oz: The Great and Powerful just started production at the end of last month in Campbell's and Raimi's home state of Michigan. James Franco is playing the title role of L. Frank Baum's beloved character, and was written by Mitchell Kapner (The Whole Nine Yards) and David Lindsay-Abaire (Rabbit Hole). The cast includes Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz and Michelle Williams as the three witches Theodora, Evanora, and Glinda, respectively, along with Zach Braff as Franco's circus assistant and the voice of a CGI winged monkey named Finley, and Joey King as the voice of CGI character China Girl. The prequel opens on March 8, 2013.
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Legendary Entertainment and director Alex Proyas (Knowing, I, Robot) recently presented some concept art for the upcoming adaptation of Paradise Lost at the 2011 Comic-Con along with Bradley Cooper, who, at the time, was the only actor cast in the movie. Benjamin Walker will join Cooper, and, ultimately, do battle with him.
Based on the 17-century poem of the same name by John Milton, Paradise Lost is an epic battle of good and evil, when Lucifer (Cooper) decides to wage war on the forces of good. Deadline reports that Walker is negotiating to play the archangel Michael and go up against Cooper. Proyas went into more detail about what the project, which will likely be in 3-D.
It's not just armies battling in an epic war. This is an adventure about the origins of good and evil after Lucifer's rebellion gets him cast out of Heaven and leads to a struggle with his brother archangel over the soul of mankind, starting with Adam and Eve. That is the scope of the narrative here, and we've tried to say as faithful as possible to Milton's text, particularly its focus on Lucifer's evolution and the birth of evil. It's a family saga, about a group of brothers, two in particular, who are on divergent paths, and Lucifer's feelings of betrayal by his father and family that forge his descent into evil.
Walker's casting is not official yet. Proyas described him as a "combination of great strength and perfect innocence" with Cooper being "the most charming guy you'll ever meet." Production is set to begin in January in Sydney, Australia, and could be released as early as late 2013, though no release date has been announced.
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Just a day after
Katrina Bowden (
30 Rock) was
announced to be joining
Paz de la Huerta (
Boardwalk Empire) in Lionsgate's upcoming
Nurse 3D,
Corbin Bleu (
High School Musical) has been added to the cast.
Variety reports Bleu will play Bowden's paramedic boyfriend in the psycho-sexual 3-D thriller, which is reportedly based on the photography of Lionsgate's chief marketing officer, Tim Palen. de la Huerta plays Abby Russell, a nurse who uses her sexuality to lure dishonest men and then punish them, so it seems that it won't be all songs and dances for Bleu. Bowden is also playing a nurse in the movie.
Douglas Aarniokoski (Animals) will direct the movie which may reportedly open sometime in 2012.
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Actor Scoot McNairy, who is best known for his part in Monsters, is joining the cast of the Warner Bros. upcoming thriller Argo, Variety reports.
Directed by Ben Affleck, Argo is based on a 2007 Wired article titled "How the CIA Used a Fake Sci-Fi Flick to Rescue Americans from Tehran" and was adapted by Chris Terrio (Heights). While McNairy's role in the movie is unknown, the actor joins a cast that includes Alan Arkin as a Hollywood producer named Lester Siegel, John Goodman as Academy Award–winning makeup artist John Chambers, Bryan Cranston as CIA agent Jack O'Donnell and Affleck as CIA exfiltration expert Tony Mendez.