House Alone

Here are 5 pics from the 4th season premiere of House. The episode is titled Alone - which will be very interesting to anybody who read my big House spoiler last week.

Carice Van Houten In Valkyrie

How's your Dutch? If its okay, then check out some news on Carice van Houten joining the cast of Bryan Singer's Valkyrie. A great move for the future Bond girl and the director alike.

I'm assuming she'll be playing Nina von Satuffenberg, the wife of Tom Cruise's character. Here's her introduction:

INT. HOSPITAL - DAY TITLES: MUNICH, GERMANY - FIRST GENERAL MILITARY HOSPITAL. 21 APRIL 1943.

A fast clicking. Heels on linoleum. A beautiful, dignified woman keeps herself from running. She is:

NINA VON STAUFFENBERG (30), Stauffenberg’s wife and mother of his four children. Beside her is BERTHOLD VON STAUFFENBERG (38), Stauffenberg’s older brother.

They reach the door of a private hospital room just as A DOCTOR comes out. Awkward pause.

DOCTOR
You are Mrs. Stauffenberg?

NINA (gesturing to Berthold)
And the Colonel’s brother, Berthold.

DOCTOR
Perhaps before you see the Colonel we should go to my office and -

NINA
I will see my husband now.

The Doctor wants to argue but Nina’s eyes shut him down. He opens the door and they enter to find...

You'll have to see the film to find out. But hopefully that gives you an idea of who Nina is, what she is like.

I like this script very much, and I think van Houten can make a great deal of this role. I'm also pleased that she appears to still be on the table for Bond 22 because, whoever they have directing, whichever draft of the script they employ, van Houten is likely to be a genuine asset to the production.

Supermarch

Seems that the next Superman will go into production in March of 2008. Apparently, this was always the plan and the World War II film Singer is making this summer was slotted in around it.

Then again, see, Singer had a long planned X-Men 3 that was promised for months if not years yet never saw the light of day. It's early for Superman Again yet, and anything could happen.

Bryan Singer On Uncanny X-Men

Rich Johnston has this evening confirmed (well, I'll happily call it a confirmation) that Bryan Singer's run on Ultimate X-Men will be going ahead "in conjunction with Marc Andreyko".

[EDIT: Yes, Ultimate. Not Uncanny. My mistake]

Ciggie Science

What do The Birds and The Usual Supects have in common?

Thanks to Mart for the tip off.

Ving Rhames On Football Wives

Lucy Lawless and Kiele Sanchez joined the cast last of Football Wives week, now Ving Rhames has been added on too. He's playing the GM of one of the teams.

I'm really quite sceptical about this series, despite the Bryan Singer factor. Then again, I was really quite sceptical about NBC's version of The Office as well, and that turned out rather well indeed.

Lawless To Sub For Lucker

Lucy Lawless, one time Warrior Princess, has been cast as Tanya in Football Wives, Bryan Singer's pilot for an American refry of Footballer's Wives.

Zoe Lucker originated the role in the UK version at a camp panto-pitch far beyond the tolerance of any US TV network, and became both loved and hated for it.

See both Lawless and Lucker above for a contrast-and-compare. Can we divine anything of the new series' approach from this single vague variance in casting attitude...? Well, not much.

Nottingham's Politics

Russell Crowe is to play the Sheriff of Nottingham in... well, in Nottingham, appropriately enough. The film is a thoroughly revisionist retread of the Robin Hood stories, this time with the Sheriff as our protagonist and unruly Robin as the antagonist. What's to say this ends up having some (most likely misfiring) critique of the Bush administration woven in? Something about how Robin's heroism is just mythical and how, really, he's just a crook? I wouldn't be surprised one iota. Comparing Bush to Robin Hood is a dangerous game, however, and runs the risk of simply being muddy. We'll see.

The film is now set up to go at Universal, freshly greenlit with a full tank of cash. At other studios Bryan Singer and Sam Raimi were actually attached to direct, but now it seems that both are out of the frame and, odds are, somebody somewhat less interesting will end up in the chair. Of course, one Tony Grisoni rewrite in this could make a very interesting Terry Gilliam project... but I'm not even going to hope.

Football Wives

Football Wives is to be the US version of Footballer's Wives. I'm assuming the name change means some of the wives will be married to managers and so on, because there's no other reason for it, surely?

A few months ago, it was revealed that Bryan Singer was going to be producing the show and that he might even direct the pilot episode. At the moment, there's still been no clarification on this, but casting news is starting to leak out. Casting news of dubious veracity, but casting news nonetheless.

Some tabloid scamps in the UK are reporting that Heather Mills is negotiating a lead role in the series. Doesn't seem like the sort of casting Singer would normally go for...

The articles also imply that show is still about soccer and this is the real red flag for me. No American show about Soccer would be called Football Wives, surely? Wouldn't that be Soccer Wives?