Carey Mulligan and Jodie Foster Drop Out of STOKER; Mia Wasikowska and Chan-wook Park Drop In

We heard last week that Mia Wasikowska (The Kids Are All Right) hopes to fit both Stoker and The Wettest County in the World on to her 2011 production schedule.  Given recent news, Fox Searchlight has extra motivation to sign Wasikowska to the former.  The earlier report suggested Wasikowska would join the previously attached Carey Mulligan and Jodie Foster.  However, Deadline hears Foster is no longer on board and Wasikowska will actually replace Mulligan in the lead role, “an eccentric teen whose enigmatic and estranged uncle returns to the family after the death of the girl’s father.”  Those are two tough losses, and I’d be interested to hear why Mulligan and/or Foster moved on if details ever surface.  More after the jump:

On a more positive note, Deadline seems confident that Chan-wook Park (Oldboy) is in the director’s chair.  Park entered negotiations late last year, but this is the closest we’ve come to confirmation that this will indeed be the director’s English-language debut.  Actor Wentworth Miller (Resident Evil: Afterlife) penned the script, which landed on the 2010 Black List of Hollywood’s best unproduced screenplays; Miller reportedly already has a prequel script titled Uncle Charlie on file.

Wasikowska will next be seen in an adaptation of Jane Eyre, due March 11.  Gus Van Sant’s Restless is likewise in the can, but the release was pushed to sometime later in 2011.  In addition to The Wettest County in the World, Wasikowska has been linked to Albert Nobbs, A View from the Bridge, and Jim Jarmusch’s next film (hence the scheduling difficulties).