Bradley Cooper is an actor whose star has been on the rise these last few years, earning back-to-back Oscar nominations for Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle.  Cooper is back in the awards mix this year with American Sniper, a film he produced, and now he’s looking to stretch his talents even further by stepping into the director’s chair.  Deadline reported earlier today that Cooper and Robert De Niro were looking to star in the drama/comedy Honeymoon with Harry with Crazy, Stupid, Love. scribe Dan Fogelman coming on to do a rewrite tailored to the two actors, but not only is Cooper looking to star in the film, he also hopes to direct it.  More after the jump.

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Per Deadline, Cooper is hoping to direct Honeymoon with Harry for New Line, marking his feature directorial debut.  The actor is apparently eyeing several projects to direct, making it known that he’s keen on switching things up in his career path.

Honeymoon with Harry has been floating around as a project for awhile now, with a previous iteration pairing Vince Vaughn with Jack Nicholson under the direction of Paul Haggis. The story revolves around a “formerly self-centered womanizing booze-hound who changed his ways when he met a girl and fell in love.”  The girl’s father disapproves, and after the woman dies shortly before their wedding, the devastated groom sets off on their honeymoon to drink himself to death.  This being the movies and all, he ends up running across the woman’s father who has ventured to spread his daughter’s ashes on her favorite beach.

Cooper would play the lead while De Niro would play the father, and this character-centric two-hander sounds like a fine project for Cooper to cut his teeth on.  The guy is an undeniably talented actor, so I’m curious to see how he holds up behind the camera.

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