Casting round-up with tidbits on Mark Walhberg, David Strathairn, Carey Mulligan, RZA, and more

June 28th 2011, 6:45am

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

– Mark Wahlberg is in early talks to join director Allen Hughes (brother of Albert and one half of “The Hughes Brothers”) in a noir-style drama called BROKEN CITY, about “an ex-cop-turned-private detective who is hired by the mayor to see if his wife is cheating on him. When the mayor’s wife’s cheating partner ends up dead, the private eye immerses himself in the mayor’s business and uncovers a real estate scandal.” Screenplay, from writer Brian Tucker, was one of 2008’s Blacklist scripts. Film is said to be budgeted at $60 million. [Via Deadline]

– David Strathairn is the latest great actor to be brought aboard Steven Spielberg’s LINCOLN. He will play William Seward, “Abraham Lincoln’s Secretary of State, an outspoken abolitionist and a core member of Lincoln’s wartime cabinet.” Strathairn joins the likes of Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tommy Lee Jones, Tim Blake Nelson, James Spader, John Hawkes, Hal Holbrook, David Costabile, Joseph Cross, Byron Jennings, Dakin Matthews, Bruce McGill, Boris McGiver, Gloria Reuben, Jeremy Strong, and David Warshofsky. Whew! The film is set to begin production this fall in Virginia for a late 2012 release. [Via Deadline]

– Haley Joel Osment is alive and well and has been cast in WAKE THE DEAD, a modern-day retelling of the classic Frankenstein tale from director Jay Russell (LADDER 49) based on the graphic novels by Steve Niles. Osment will play the part of Victor Franklin, “a college student experimenting with reversing death.” Production is expected to begin this fall. [Via Variety]

– Carey Mulligan has become attached to star in a an original sci-fi film called OUTBACK from director Gary Ross (THE HUNGER GAMES). The story, to be written by Nissar Modi (Z FOR ZACHARIAH) from an idea conceived by him and Ross, is being kept under wraps at the moment, but the film is said to be set, appropriately, in the Australian outback. [Via Variety]

– The RZA and D.J. Cotrona (“Detroit 187”) are the latest to join Dwayne Johnson and Channing Tatum in the G.I. JOE sequel from JUSTIN BIEBER: NEVER SAY NEVER director Jon Chu. Cortrona will play Flint, “a Joe soldier best known in the toyline and 1980s comics for his shotgun and beret,” while RZA will portray a martial arts maestro known as the Blind Master “who in the past trained Joe commandos Snake-Eyes and Jinx.” [Via THR]