‘Big Year’ Begins Filming, Adds Rashida Jones
Rashida Jones
Owen Wilson and Jack Black’s upcoming birdwatcher comedy The Big Year has started filming in Vancouver, based on published reports. The cast is expanding to include Rashida Jones (I Love You, Man) who will be playing the love interest for Black’s character, according to MovieWeb.
The film is being produced by Ben Stiller and Red Hour Productions, and is directed by David Frankel (Marley & Me). Other cast members include Steve Martin, Rosamund Pike, JoBeth Williams, Brian Dennehy, Dianne Wiest, Anthony Anderson, Tim Blake Nelson, Kevin Pollak, Joel McHale, Anjelica Huston, and Jim Parsons.
With this very large cast filled with notable names, one starts to feel that expectations for this film should be sky high when it is released in 2011. Parsons has real buzz on TV’s The Big Bang Theory, and despite losing street-cred with the Pink Panther movies Steve Martin can still be very funny with the right material. Though much of the cast is past their prime or known more for TV work, this still looks like an A-list project.
I know the book was pretty popular, but with that sort of cast you’ve got to think that salaries alone would make this a fairly expensive movie (even for a comedy). Kind of makes you wonder why they can make this but not Anchorman 2 or Zoolander 2. Just sayin.