We’ve got some new casting news:
- Kelly Reilly (Flight) has landed the female lead role in Heaven Is for Real, based on the book with the same name, about a young boy named Colton Burpo who comes out of an emergency operation with compelling stories of a visit to heaven. Greg Kinnear will also star as Reilly’s husband in the film.
- Model and actress Kate Upton (The Three Stooges) is in talks to join Nick Cassavetes’s The Other Woman, which will also star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Cameron Diaz and Leslie Mann.
- Tony Goldwyn (The Mechanic) has just joined director Neil Burger’s film Divergent, which is a futuristic thriller based on author Veronica Roth’s New York Times bestseller. Divergent will also star Shailene Woodley (The Descendants), Theo James (Underworld: Awakening), and Kate Winslet.
Hit the jump for additional pertinent information on the casting.
In Heaven Is for Real, Deadline reports that Reilly is set to play Colton Burpo’s mother, while Kinnear will play Todd Burpo, a Nebraska pastor, and the father of Colton. Randall Wallace (Braveheart) will helm the film while Joe Roth (Alice in Wonderland) and mega church pastor T.D. Jakes are set to produce the drama. The story centers around Colton’s near death experience, and how he comes back claiming to have been to heaven. Colton’s parents do not take his stories seriously until he begins to share information that a 4-year old could not possibly know by himself. The film’s release date is TBA.
Per Variety, The Other Woman is about a woman who, upon realizing she is not her boyfriend’s primary lover, plots with the man’s wife for revenge. Melissa Stack will write Cassavetes’s The Other Woman while Julie Yorn will produce the film through LBI Productions. Upton will play Coster-Waldau’s lover, who sparks jealousy from Mann and Diaz. No release dates are set for the film yet. According to Cassavetes, only the up-and-coming Sports Illustrated swimsuit model could lure a man into cheating on the likes of Mann and Diaz.
Moving on from faith-based drama and romantic comedy, Burger’s futuristic thriller Divergent will also feature Ray Stevenson (Thor 1&2), Maggie Q (Live Free or Die Hard), Mekhi Phifer, Jai Courtney (Jack Reacher), Miles Teller (21 And Over), Zoë Kravitz (X-Men: First Class), Ansel Elgort, Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Ben Lamb, Christian Madsen, and Amy Newbold (Downton Abbey). Goldwyn will play the father of protagonist Tris Prior, who will be played by Woodley. Set in the future, Divergent deals with a society divided into different factions based on personality. Protagonist Tris Prior, who has a Divergent personality, does not fit into any of the groups. After discovering a conspiracy to kill all Divergents, Prior must learn what makes Divergents such a threat before she runs out of time. The film is set for release sometime in 2014.
