Earlier today, The Wrap reported Bill Hader was going to star in Paramount’s Baywatch movie that’s being directed by Reno 911! co-creator and star Robert Ben Garant.  They said he would be playing the role David Hasselhoff played on the long running TV series.  However, when I reached out to confirm the story, Hader’s rep (who also reps Garant)  told me it wasn’t true and the script isn’t even finished yet.  According to The Wrap, the Baywatch movie will “follow lifeguards exploring an oil rig of the Malibu coast that turns out to be a meth lab. Jeremy Garelick and Peter Tolan both wrote drafts of the script, which Garant has revisited.”

I’m a huge Bill Hader fan and would love to see him take the lead in a big Hollywood movie.  However, I’m not convinced this is the right project.  More as we hear it.

Just because you forgot about it doesn’t mean it’s not happening.  Paramount is still trying to develop a feature film based on the popular slow motion running drama series Baywatch, and some new blood has been brought in to revitalize the project.  Screenwriter Peter Tolan (Rescue Me) was previously tapped to write the script, and last year he revealed that his take would be a comedy adaptation more akin to Stripes rather than a straight feature film iteration of the self-serious lifeguard series.  Now Vulture reports that Reno 911! co-creator and star Robert Ben Garant has been lined up to direct the film.

Garant previously directed Reno 911! Miami and Balls of Fury and has forged a successful screenwriting career with fellow Reno 911! cohort Thomas Lennon.  The duo wrote the Night at the Museum films as well as other family fare like Herbie Fully Loaded and The Pacifier (they chronicled their success in the book Writing Movies For Fun And Profit).  Though a Baywatch film in and of itself sounds like a bad idea, I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing a Reno 911! take on the group of lifeguards.  No word on whether Garant would take a stab at the script himself, but I assume he’ll put his own spin on the material.

Every once in a while, a “story” comes along that is so ridiculous that I can’t resist writing about it. This is one of those “stories.” Regardless of your age, chances are you either remember watching or have heard about planet Earth’s infatuation with the 90s beach drama Baywatch. Starring David Hasselhoff’s hair and Pamela Anderson’s one-piece, the show followed the adventures of Los Angeles County lifeguards who just couldn’t help but seem attractive regardless of whatever near-death scenario they found themselves in.

So popular was Baywatch that its 1.1 billion internationally-based, weekly viewers made it the most watched television series of all time. Although the original iteration of the show ended back in 1999, plans to bring Baywatch to the big screen have been making the rounds in Hollywood since 2004. Now, it looks as if a script by Rescue Me‘s Peter Tolan may finally make the Baywatch movie dream a reality. The only catch? It has absolutely nothing to do with the show. More after the jump.