Jonah Hill and Mark Wahlberg look to become a 21st century Murtaugh and Riggs (minus the racial differences)
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EXCLUSIVE: Film fans are starting to get glimpses of Jonah Hill as something more than a comedic actor. He will play it straight as a whippersnapper executive in the upcoming baseball drama ‘Moneyball,’ and at least has a few chases and busts on his mind in the remake of ’21 Jump Street.’
Now Hill looks to be further pursuing an action plan. The actor has come aboard to play one half of a bumbling pair of antiheroes in the action comedy ‘Good Time Gang,’ with Mark Wahlberg playing his partner, according to a person who was briefed on the project but who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak about it publicly.
The film, which is set up as an independent project with the company RCR Pictures, follows two party-happy mercenaries who decide to take on a more serious case involving a terrorist, only to find their mission complicated when they discover one of them is related to the target. The film has been described by two people familiar with it as a new spin on ‘Lethal Weapon,’ with a bit more of an emphasis on the action than on the comedy. An assistant to RCR principal Robin Schorr said Schorr had no comment.
‘Good Time Gang’ is one of several films that Hollywood is developing from young screenwriter Max Landis (son of John, and writer behind a Frankenstein movie currently set up at 20th Century Fox). The producers have not yet hired a director. RCR Pictures is financed by world poker champion Chris Ferguson and run by Schorr, a veteran producer who counts the documentary ‘Food, Inc.’ among her credits.
Wahlberg, who’s currently shooting Seth MacFarlane’s feature debut ‘Ted,’ would be continuing a buddy action-comedy trail that he began with Will Ferrell in ‘The Other Guys’ last year. In addition to ’21 Jump Street,’ which hits theaters in March, Hill will offer a dose of action-flavored comedy with this fall’s ‘The Sitter,’ a loose reimagining of Elisabeth Shue’s ‘80s hit ‘Adventures in Babysitting.’
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-- Steven Zeitchik
