Big Picture
Michele Williams: Paris Pretty Plus, Victoria Beckham struts and Courteney Cox steals a smooch. Get the latest pics!
MORE PHOTOS +Most Commented
- TV's Top Couples Tournament: Vote in the Final Round! (2036)
- TV's Top Couples Tournament: This Round Is Closed, Please Stand By (698)
- Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart Photos Galore! New Pics From Their Post-Twilight Flicks! (600)
- Afternoon Mail! Are Gleeks Having More Sex Than Vamps? (586)
- TV's Top Couple Tournament: And the Winner Is... (502)
- Beyoncé and Jay-Z Share First Photos of Baby Blue Ivy! (398)
- Whitney Houston Dead at 48 (396)
- Life After Breaking Dawn?! Maybe, Says Studio Head! (226)
- Morning Mail! Céline Dion Talks Whitney Houston's Tragic Death (222)
- Blind Vice! Nevis Divine's Sad Past (214)
Top 10 Stories
- Angelina Jolie Tears Up—Watch Her Get Emotional
- Josh Duhamel Not Coming Back for Transformers 4: Is Anyone?!
- Spoiler Chat Daily: A New Girl Baby on the Way?! Plus, Scoop on Vampire Diaries, Glee and More
- Jersey Shore Sneak Peek: Pauly D Pulls a Fast (and Dirty) One on Deena
- American Idol: Did Tent Girl Get Better? Who Passed Out Onstage? And Who's Headed to Vegas?!
- Survivor: One World Insider: Chivalry Is Dead, Y'All
- Seal Takes Off His Wedding Ring
- Kim Kardashian, Movie Star? It's "Very Much Possible," Says Tyler Perry
- Charlie Sheen Gets Cease-and-Desist From Warner Bros.: Don't Use Our Men Photos!
- Grey's Anatomy: Ellen Pompeo Opens Up About Baby "Guilt," Her TV Marriage and Cristina's Crisis
Fashion Police
Leighton's Valentine's Look Plus, Ashlee Simpson and Cate Blanchett. Rate the highs and lows!
MORE PHOTOS +
Our Partners
Renée and Bobby McGee
Looks like Renée Zellweger will get a two-for-one deal out of that Bridget Jones sequel weight gain.
The Chicago star has signed on to channel the pudgy singing legend Janis Joplin in a forever-in-development biopic.
According to Daily Variety, the Golden Globe-winning actress will step up to the microphone as the late, gravel-throated songstress, who died of a drug overdose at 27 in 1970, in Piece of My Heart. The movie is slated to start filming immediately after Zellweger wraps work on Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason.
Zellweger will also act as a producer on the picture, joining forces will Lakeshore's Tom Rosenbert and Gary Lucchesi and Paramount Pictures.
"Renée has been obsessed with Janis for years and is totally committed to this," Rosenberg tells Variety. "We are looking to quickly bring aboard a writer-director so that this can be the picture she makes after the sequel to Bridget Jones's Diary."
The Joplin biopic has been a long time coming. For seven years, Lakeshore has been trying to get cameras rolling, drafting multiple scripts and signing rocker Melissa Etheridge and Just Married star Brittany Murphy at different times to don the peace beads and Birkenstocks as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame belter.
Now that Zellweger has come aboard the Paramount film, two rival Janis flicks on the drawing board for years seem doomed. One, titled Janis and sanctioned by Joplin's family, was to have starred Lili Taylor as the singer; the other is a low-budget indie based on the stage play Love, Janis with the show's Laura Theodore slated to reprise her role opposite Roy Schieder, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Willie Nelson, Jennifer Tilly and Sam Andrew, the founder of Joplin's band, Big Brother and the Holding Company.
Piece of My Heart producers now say that with the Oscar nominee attached, they are moving full steam ahead, with the actress in charge of selecting a shooting script, writer and director for the project.
"Janis Joplin's life is a story that needs to be told, and there is no one better to portray her than Renee Zellweger," Paramount Pictures chair Sherry Lansing tells Variety.
No word yet on whether Zellweger will lend her pipes to the film to belt out such Joplin classics as "Me and Bobby McGee," "Piece of My Heart," "Ball and Chain" and "Mercedes Benz," though she did sing in both Chicago and this year's Down with Love. Both Etheridge and Murphy had planned to sing when they were attached to the project.
Regardless, the producers are confident that the casting is perfect.
"Aside from Renée's talent, it's a plus that she's from Texas like Janis was because she can appreciate the courage it took to leave there and go to San Francisco and make a career rather than stay behind and conform to the life her parents were hoping for," says Lucchesi.
Indeed, Zellweger has come a long way from Texas. Since making waves opposite Tom Cruise in Jerry Maguire in 1996, she has been on a direct path to stardom, getting a huge boost--and Oscar nominations--from the hits Chicago and Bridget Jones's Diary. Next up, she'll be seen opposite Jude Law and Nicole Kidman in Cold Mountain, a Civil War drama that opens in December.
0 Comments
Now loading...