The NY Times ran an article on Russell Brand's Arthur remake the other day and included were the first official images from the production - currently filming in New York City.  While the images are your typical first look photos (nothing like the stuff we've already posted of Batman and Robin, the Batmobile, and the DeLorean from Back to the Future) the article was very interesting because it revealed how involved the Modern Family writers were in the script.  It seems that director Jason Winer - who helmed thirteen episodes of Modern Family during it's first season - had seven of the writers do a line-by-line dialogue tuneup.  As a big fan of Modern Family, trust me when I say, the writers know what they're doing and I'm sure they helped improve the script.  Some of the other interesting things were:

  • Greta Gerwig's first day of shooting was a largely improvised scene in front of the 42nd Street exit of Grand Central Terminal during Monday-morning rush hour
  • Arthur is still very rich and very drunk
  • Peter Baynham, the original writer, is on set every day doing rewrites
  • Since Russell Brand is now clean and sober, to get into character, he takes a sniff of booze before filming
  • Brand watched James Stewart in The Philadelphia Story, Nicolas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas, and the original Arthur before filming began

Hit the jump for the images: