Casting Couch: Silent Bob 'Dies Hard'
Posted Wednesday, January 3, 2007 at 4:48 PM Central
by John Couture
Writer-director and now actor Kevin Smith has said on many occasions that it was his love of Die Hard that led him to cast Alan Rickman as the Metatron in Dogma. Bruce Willis fan-boy Smith brought the story full-circle last month when he spent several days filming a small role on the fourth installment of the John McClane franchise Live Free or Die Hard.
Playing a mute in his View Askew movies is paying big dividends for Smith this year with his supporting role in the upcoming Jennifer Garner flick Catch and Release. The actor also recently wrapped a pilot for Showtime for a series called "Manchild" and has cameos in TMNT, Southland Tales and Fanboys on tap for 2007.
With all this acting work popping up for Smith, poor Daredevil will never conquer Bullseye. But speaking of comic books, everyone's favorite TV "Hiro" is making a jump of sorts to the big screen. Masi Oka is in talks to join the blackjack tale 21. Oka, who plays Hiro Nakamura on the hit NBC show Heroes, is no stranger to celluloid.
Masi Oka, who sports an IQ somewhere north of 180, was still currently employed by Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) as of November. Oka's digital artist work can be seen on such Hollywood blockbusters as Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and all three of the newer Star Wars movies.
Let's just hope that Masi isn't responsible for Jar Jar Binks.
Finally, a potential blockbuster casting coup is under way. Rumors are popping up all over the web that Robert De Niro and George Clooney might be set to play competing cops in 36, the remake of a french thriller starring Gerard Depardieu (naturally).
I'm beginning to think that the French Revolution was nothing more that a publicity campaign to advocate the casting of Gerard Depardieu in all movies made in France. But, I digress. 36 follows two cops as they compete to solve a series of armored car robberies. The prize? A promotion, of course.
And to think, for a minute there, I thought Danny Ocean might be getting the team back together to knock off Ace's Casino.