You know what it’s like when you discover a little-known band, love the hell out of them, and then they get really big and everyone loves them and, even though you’re pleased for them and all, you can’t help but feel slightly jealous that the world and his wife have discovered your precious secret?
Well, that’s how Empire feels about Michael Cera. The preternaturally-talented teen actor, whose mutant power is uncanny comic timing and who does the best embarrassed reaction/stammer/stumble in the business, was one of the best things about the late, lamented sitcom Arrested Development (no mean task in a cast featuring Jason Bateman, Jeffrey Tambor and Will Arnett), and his cult online-only sitcom, Clark And Michael, is an absolute hoot.
But – largely because Arrested Development was so low-key – Cera felt like he belonged to us, a small but powerful and virile cult of Cerabites who worshipped his every perfectly-pitched nervous laugh.
But now our little boy is all grown up – he’s about to go mega courtesy of his starring role in the hilarious teen comedy, Superbad, and today came news (in the fourth paragraph, go figure) that he further plans to make films that are, y’know, seen by more than four people and a cat with rabies.
For he has signed on to play the lead in the teen comedy Youth In Revolt for Dimension. Based on a popular novel by C.D. Payne, which spawned three sequels, Cera will play a young, cynical, sex-obsessed (although presumably still nervous and stammering) man who meets the girl of his dreams while on holiday, and goes through hell to be with her.
Of course, Cera (who, fact fans, is a Facebook friend of Edgar Wright, but who resolutely refuses to add Empire, bah humbug) also has Juno – to be screened at the Toronto Film Festival – on his slate, and he’s just been cast alongside Jack Black in The Year One, so this is hardly the beginning of his big-screen career. But anything that gets our boy out to the masses is a good thing, so we’ll be keeping an eye on Youth In Revolt. But, you understand, that eye will have a single tear forming in the corner. God, they grow up so fast…