Director Larry Charles to helm Jim Carrey comedy Pierre Pierre

This could be interesting. Director Larry Charlies (BRUNO, RELIGULOUS, BORAT, the Bob Dylan collaboration MASKED AND ANONYMOUS) has signed on to direct Jim Carrey in the comedy PIERRE PIERRE, according to Deadline’s Mike Fleming.

We last talked about this project back in 2008 when Jason Reitman was attached to take the directing reins. The film was described then as being about “a self-indulgent French nihilist who transports a stolen painting from Paris to London.” The script, from newcomers Edwin Cannistraci and Frederick Seton, was on 2007’s Black List and sold for $1 million dollars after a bidding war between three studios. The film is now currently looking to be made with a budget of just over $20 million.

Charles is interesting to me because, while the varying successes of his two largest films (BORAT and BRUNO) are probably most attributable to their star Sacha Baron Cohen, the director comes with a pretty good comedy pedigree which includes having been a writer and story editor on “Seinfeld” as well as a director on many episodes of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” (Charles is pretty much an HBO mainstay, in fact). Now, whether that actually means anything is left to be seen, but again, they’re just tidbits of info that make me stroke my chin in a contemplatively pleasing way.