Last weekend the word was Kevin Bacon was negotiating to play the villain in X-Men: First Class and today Variety reports negotiations have completed and Bacon has officially signed on. Unfortunately his exact character is still being kept under tight wraps so the guessing will have to continue for now. Names such as Mr. Sinister (pictured), Sebastian Shaw, Mastermind, David Moreau, Carl Denti or Graydon Creed were among the many guesses from around the web.
Bacon joins James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Alice Eve, Nicholas Hoult, Caleb Landry Jones, Jennifer Lawrence and Lucas Till in the Matthew Vaughn (Kick-Ass) directed feature which is set to hit theaters on June 3, 2011.
Next comes a SPOILER FILLED description of the opening sequence to Michael Bay’s Transformers 3 courtesy of CHUD. I am adding it directly below, but haven’t read it myself so I can’t tell you much, but you can feel free to read if you like. Just highlight the text to give it a read:
There’s a disturbance on the Moon. A robot shaped disturbance. Scientists on Earth see this and the information gets passed up the chain of command. In the White House men in black suits are breathlessly running through the halls, and they burst into the Oval Office. The president is behind the desk, back turned to the door, looking out the window. One of the men tells the president, ‘Sir, something’s happened on the Moon!’ The president turns around.
It’s John F. Kennedy.
Yes, the opening scene of Transformers 3 takes place in 1961 or 1962. The gist of the story has to do with the Transformers’ involvement in the space race, and this is the reason why JFK was so hot to make sure America was first to the Moon. It sounds like a fun direction; there are a lot of stupid conspiracy theories about Neil Armstrong et al meeting ETs on the Moon, and this is a fun way to play with them. I hear this was Spielberg’s idea, and it really does sound like something he’d come up with. If you’re like me and you like the Spielberg-influenced Transformers but hate the mostly Spielberg-free Transformers 2, this is all good news.
Roman Polanski is free (for now) and with his freedom CBC says he plans to shoot a film version of the Tony Award-winning drama “God of Carnage” as his next film. This news was first revealed by the Los Angeles Times in January and Reza has now told Agence France-Presse, “The shoot is planned in early 2011. The location has not yet been chosen, but since Roman only has the right to go to Poland, Switzerland and France, there is a good chance the shoot will be close by.”
Reza’s “comedy of manners…without manners” featured the talents of Jeff Daniels, Hope Davis, James Gandolfini and Marcia Gay Harden when it played in Los Angeles back in April and May. The story begins after a playground fight between two boys, and follows two sets of parents as they attempt to resolve the children’s altercation, but instead devolve into chaos. Expectation is for it to be set in New York despite being filmed in Europe.
Are Tom Cruise and Will Smith teaming for Paper Wings? That’s the word from Access Hollywood reporting the two actors, along with Smith’s wife Jada Pinkett Smith, gathered “in West Hollywood at themed restaurant Saddle Ranch Chop House” for a table read for a film titled Paper Wings. The film was first mentioned with Cruise starring alongside Reese Witherspoon. The film is described as a rodeo love tale centered on a rodeo champ (Cruise) falling for an up-and-coming country singer (Witherspoon). Will Smith’s Overbrook Entertainment is producing the picture and word is Smith’s Pursuit of Happyness helmer, Gabriele Muccino, is one of many names mentioned as a potential director.
A small update from Paul Thomas Anderson fansite CigsandRedVines is reporting Anderson’s next film is likely set to shoot sometime next month after talking with the director at Fred Armisen’s Largo show. The film is currently untitled, but often referred to as The Master, and will star Philip Seymour Hoffman as a charismatic intellectual who in the 1950s becomes the leader of a start-up religion that takes off like wildfire. Jeremy Renner is expected to star as Hoffman’s right hand man and Reese Witherspoon was reportedly offered the role playing Hoffman’s wife and names such as Amanda Seyfried (Jennifer’s Body), Emma Stone (Zombieland) and Deborah Ann Woll (“True Blood”) have been mentioned as candidates for the role of Elizabeth, the daughter.
Finally, here’s the first clip from the upcoming Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg cop comedy The Other Guys, which is set to hit theaters on August 6.
