I thought from the start this was going to be about the cigarette company, but apparently Jim Carrey has not signed on to star in the sequel to Thank You for Smoking, instead the new dark comedy I Love You Phillip Morris finds Carrey as a conman whose love for a cellmate leads him to make several prison escapes.
The film was written and will mark the directing debut of Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, the writing team behind Bad Santa. The film is based on a book by Houston Chronicle crime reporter Steve McVicker, the fact-based film casts Carrey as Steven Russell, a married father whose exploits landed him in the Texas criminal justice system.
In jail Russell fell madly in love with his cellmate, who eventually was set free, which led him to escape from Texas prisons four times. Variety reports that the script has some of the dark edges of Bad Santa but is grounded by the affable and lovesick character of Russell. Apparently the pitch was sold as Catch Me if You Can meets Brokeback Mountain.
I guess Jim Carrey finally found a project he could get on board with that didn’t include any big names as several of his other recent projects seemed to have fallen apart. However, one that was presumably dead a while back seems to keep popping up and that is Ripley’s Believe It or Not! with Tim Burton directing. Word is that Steve Oedekerk’s rewrite has been received quite well.
