Nicole Kidman Back At Work After On-Set Car Crash
Nicole, you should be ashamed of yourself. Today is Australia Day. The only thing more un-Australian than working on a public holiday – this one especially – is not claiming a day’s worker’s compo. On a public holiday. Especially this one, and Extra-specially (Australians have special dispensation to use words like this on Australia Day) when you’re entitled to it. Take a good, hard look at yourself, Kidman! How are you ever going to win 'Strayan Of The Year with behaviour like that? For those who don’t know, Nicole was in a car accident yesterday, on the set of Invasion (aka “that other film she’s in with Daniel Craig as co-star”, which is a part re-make of Invasion Of The Body Snatchers). It was apparently a scene where she drives a Jaguar while several ‘zombie-like characters’ hang on to the bonnet. The car was on a rig, but somehow wound up colliding with a lamp post, causing minor injuries to about 8 people, including Kidman. Everyone is reportedly okay though, and the star is resuming work today, so no disruptions to the schedule, and certainly no impediment on her next film, Australia. Tsk.
Wenham In Australia
****Some more good news vaguely about The Lucky Country. David Wenham has joined the cast of Baz Luhrmann’s Australia. He’s set to play the dastardly station manager of an outback ranch who plots to take over the land and cattle owned by prim Aristocrat (Nicole Kidman, as mentioned above). Wenham will next be on screen in 300, which is, coincidentally, our next story.
**300 – Now Kicking More Ass (Per Square Metre) Than Ever!
Told you so. **Warner Brothers have announced that 300 will be the first feature film of 2007 to be getting the Imax treatment. Zack Snyder’s Spartan bloodbath is being remastered to fit the bigger format, and will go into 40 screens in the USA, and 15 across the rest of the world – one of which must and shall be London. This upsizing effectively means that the average Spartan warrior’s abs could reach up to 30 feet wide. Each. Excuse us while we resuscitate Helen O’Hara with a brown paper bag; normal service will resume shortly.
**Keitel set to join The Ministers
**Harvey Keitel (that’s Mr White to some of you, Mr Wolf to others, or, if you’re a real buff, Fingers) has all but signed on the dotted line to join the cast of The Ministers, the new film from Franc. Reyes, who made a bit of a splash in 2002 with Empire (the movie, not us). It concerns a female police detective in New York (Florencia Lozano) who spends a lot of her time trying to track down a group who call themselves the Ministers, and who killed her father. They have started killing again, and while she’s hunting them down – wouldn’t you know it – she unknowingly becomes romantically involved with one of them. Also in the cast are John Leguizamo and Diane Venora.
Ron Howard to direct The Emperor’s Children?
Claire Messud’s novel The Emperor’s Children has been something of a hot property in Hollywood of late, but the option has been secured by Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment. This is Brian Grazer’s company, and he’s set to produce, with long-time business partner Ron Howard currently considering whether to take on directing duties. According to the press release, it’s a ‘comedy of manners’ set in the months leading up to and following the World Trade Center attacks. The story focuses on three well educated students, all about to turn 30, and all struggling to live up to the expectations of their upper crust families. A tenner says they’ve already called Zach Braff’s agent.