We’ve got a few casting stories to attend to this afternoon. Briefly:
- Steve Martin and Jennifer Lopez have joined the voice cast for DreamWorks Animation’s new film Home, which is an adaptation of the children’s book The True Meaning of Smekday.
- Kathryn Hahn (Step Brothers) is making a late addition to the cast of Brad Bird’s Tomorrowland, which is lead by George Clooney and is now in production in Vancouver.
- Chronicle star Alex Russell has been added to the cast of Angelina Jolie’s next directorial effort, Unbroken.
Hit the jump for more on the aforementioned casting stories.
Steve Martin and Jennifer Lopez have been added to the voice cast of director Tim Johnson’s (Over the Hedge) DreamWorks Animation film Home, which was previously referred to as Happy Smekday!. The Wrap reports that Martin will play Captain Spek, leader of an overly optimistic alien race called the Boov that invades Earth and begins relocating its inhabitants. Lopez will play the mother of a character voiced by Rihanna, a girl who avoids capture and teams up with a banished Boov voiced by Jim Parsons. The film is slated to open November 25, 2014.
Excellent comedy actress Kathryn Hahn—who recently showed off her dramatic chops in Afternoon Delight—has joined the cast of Tomorrowland, which is described thusly: Bound by a shared destiny, a bright, optimistic teen (Britt Robertson) bursting with scientific curiosity and a former boy-genius inventor (George Clooney) jaded by disillusionment embark on a danger-filled mission to unearth the secrets of an enigmatic place somewhere in time and space that exists in their collective memory as “Tomorrowland." The cast also includes Hugh Laurie as the villain, and Heat Vision reports that Hahn will be playing a “funny, scene-stealing” character named Ursula. Damon Lindelof penned the screenplay alongside Bird.
Finally, Chronicle and Carrie star Alex Russell has been added to Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken. Based on the non-fiction book by Lauren Hillenbrand, Unbroken tells the incredible true story of Louis Zamperini, a former Olympian and WWII bombardier whose plane crashed at sea in 1943. Zamperini and two crewmates floated adrift for 47 days and 2000 miles, eventually finding themselves caught by the Japanese Navy and sent to a POW camp where Zamperini was targeted by a sadistic overseer.
Jack O’Connell is set in the lead role, and Inside Film (via The Playlist) reports that Russell will play Pete, Zamperini’s older brother and member of the US athletics team at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Garrett Hedlund and Domnhall Gleeson also star in the pic, which begins filming in Australia soon in anticipation of a Christmas Day 2014 release.
