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Ripley's Resurrected
Believe it.
Just when it looked like the much hyped, very expensive Ripley's Believe It or Not—a fantasy blockbuster based on the life of curiosity collector Robert Ripley and directed by Tim Burton and starring Jim Carrey—had been consigned to the celluloid scrap heap, Paramount Pictures has revived the project for a planned 2009 release, according to Variety.
The studio originally planned for Ripley's to be one of its 2008 summer tent-pole releases. But Paramount suits grew nervous as the budget headed north of $150 million, and Burton and Carey pressed for a rewrite of the script by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (Ed Wood). In June, just months before the scheduled start of principal photography in China, the studio shelved the film.
When Burton then committed to helming a big-screen version of the Stephen Sondheim musical Sweeney Todd for Christmas 2007, reuniting him with longtime muse Johnny Depp, the future of Ripley's seemed bleak.
Paramount boss Brad Grey reportedly has resurrected Ripley's after figuring ways to keep the budget manageable. To that end, the studio has brought in Steve Oedekerk to pen the screenplay. Oedekerk is a longtime Carrey pal, dating from the In Living Color days. He also directed Carrey in 1995's Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls and wrote the script for 2003's Bruce Almighty. According to Variety, Oedekerk will be paid a seven-figure sum to fashion a story around Ripley's love of the bizarre, which the original comic panel and subsequent television shows mined to great success.
Carrey and Burton are still attached to the project, though there's no word yet on a new start date. Paramount did not immediately comment on the trade report.
Ripley's was one of three high-profile projects that Carrey has had trouble getting off the ground. Earlier this year, Fox nixed the Jay Roach-helmed Used Guys, which would have paired Carrey with Ben Stiller, citing budget concerns. Focus Features then scuttled the dramedy A Little Game Without Consequence, which would have reteamed Carrey with Mask cohort Cameron Diaz, over unspecified creative differences.
Carrey next appears in theaters Feb. 23 in Joel Schumacher's mystery thriller The Number 23, and will also lend his voice to an animated movie based on Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who, due out in March 2008.
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