Lionsgate and Nu Image have announced The Big Wedding, a Nu Image / Millennium Films production that Lionsgate will be distributing in the U.S. and the U.K. The announcement was made jointly by Joe Drake, President of Lionsgate’s Motion Picture Group, Jason Constantine, Lionsgate’s President of Acquisitions and Co-Productions, and Avi Lerner, Founder and Co-Chairman of Nu Image, who is handling international sales of the film.
The film, which boasts an all-star cast including Robert De Niro, Susan Sarandon, Diane Keaton, Katherine Heigl, Amanda Seyfried, Robin Williams, Ben Barnes and Topher Grace, is currently shooting in Greenwich, Connecticut.
Written and directed by Justin Zackham (The Bucket List), the film centers around Don (De Niro) and Ellie (Keaton), a long divorced couple being forced to pretend that they are still happily married at their son’s wedding. Among all of their family and friends, the hoax snowballs into a poignant and raucously funny story about the ties that bind.
Nu Image’s Avi Lerner, Danny Dimbort and Trevor Short are executive producing, with Justin Zackham, Clay Pecorin, Richard Salvatore and Harry Ufland producing.
“‘The Big Wedding’ is a charming, rollicking movie that promises to be an instant intergenerational family comedy classic,” explains Drake of the film’s appeal to the studio. “We are thrilled to be in business once again with Avi and Nu Image,” adds Constantine. “After our success together with action genre films like ‘The Expendables’ and the upcoming ‘Conan the Barbarian,’ this film presented a wonderful opportunity to expand our collaborative horizons into the realm of broad comedy.”
“Our relationship with Lionsgate has always been mutually beneficial and one of great respect. A film like ‘The Big Wedding’ only reinforces that idea and takes our relationship to the next level,” says Lerner. “We know that Lionsgate’s faith in us to deliver on all of the potential of this comedy is well placed.”
The Big Wedding will be released in North America on October 19, 2012.
