EW.COM – Hazel has found her Gus!
Ansel Elgort has been offered the role of Augustus Waters—the male lead opposite Shailene Woodley—in the eagerly anticipated adaptation of John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars, directed by Josh Boone. Green’s beloved, best-selling book is a love story that is equal parts funny, sweet, and heartbreaking in its telling of Hazel and Gus, two teens who meet in a cancer support group. (EW had it on the Best Fiction of 2012 list)
“Ansel is whip-smart and uber-charismatic and everything I dreamed for Augustus Waters,” John Green tells EW in an exclusive statement. “I am by nature a cautious pessimist, but I’ll just say it: Now that we have Shailene and Ansel, I am completely, unreservedly psyched about this movie.”
Director Josh Boone tells EW: “Ansel Elgort is the epitome of the boy John Green brought to life so vividly in his novel and he truly embodies the character traits we admire so much about Gus. His humor, sensitivity, honesty and confidence floored us. Watching him with Shailene was like seeing the film for the first time. Hearing then say okay to each other was incredibly moving. We couldn’t be more thrilled to have found our Gus.”
Continue readingAnsel Elgort Offered Lead in ‘The Fault in Our Stars’
TEEN.COM – The big-screen adaptation of Veronica Roth‘s YA novel, Divergent, might not be hitting theaters until next March, but that hasn’t stopped millions from obsessing over it — present company included! Recently, Teen was able to catch up with the book’s author at the Lionsgate offices in Santa Monica (umm, no big deal), to talk about not only the film, but the book series’ third offering, Allegiant, which will be released in October.
One topic of discussion during our chat was the age gap between lead actors Shailene Woodley (Tris) and Theo James (Four). In the book, these characters are 16 and 18 respectively, but the actors playing them are a bit older at 21 and 28. When asked about the age subject, Veronica assured that fans wouldn’t be disappointed, saying:
“I think that head shots look a lot older than actual people. When I’m meeting them in real life I’m like ‘Oh yeah this is not a problem.’ Seeing them all together, they definitely look younger than you think. I was most concerned about the age gap looking okay. Obviously Shailene is [six years] younger than Theo. It doesn’t really look that way because I think when you cast an actual 16 year old and actual 18 year old they look the same age, especially if the 18 year old is a boy because they don’t age. So that would actually look kind of creepy. So I’m happy with the maturity of the actors I think that was crucial to making this movie work and by casting older actors we definitely have gotten that maturity which is amazing. I think that gap looks great in real life.”
Continue readingVeronica Roth Addresses Shailene Woodley and Theo James’ Age Gap
VARIETY.COM – With Theo James landing the male lead in Summit’s “Divergent,” the next big role for young men is the one opposite Shailene Woodley in Fox’s “The Fault in Our Stars.”
Brenton Thwaites, Nat Wolff, Nick Robinson, Noah Silver and Ansel Elgort will test this weekend for the role of Augustus “Gus” Waters, the former basketball player who lost his leg to cancer who Woodley’s character, Hazel meets in a cancer support group.
Fox had no comment.
Josh Boone is on board to direct the adaptation which is based on the book by John Green.
Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber adapted the script with Temple Hill Entertainment’s Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen producing.
Given the book’s popularity and Woodley’s rising status, it’s been a priority to find her co-star and young thesps have chased the part with equal urgency. As of now, no one is considered a front-runner.
DEADLINE.COM – Upstart distributor A24 has set a June 14 limited theatrical release launch of the Sofia Coppola-directed The Bling Ring, and it has set an August 2 limited release for the James Ponsoldt-directed The Spectacular Now. This spring, A24 launches Ginger & Rosa and Spring Breakers, films also aiming at a young demographic.
The Bling Ring stars Emma Watson, Leslie Mann, Gavin Rossdale and Paris Hilton, latter of whom was actually ripped off by the title characters, young bandits who broke into the homes of well to do celebutantes. The film’s based on the Vanity Fair article The Suspects Wore Louboutins by Nancy Jo Sales.
The Spectacular Now was scripted by (500) Days of Summer scribes Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber and stars Miles Teller, Shailene Woodley, Brie Larson, Kyle Chandler, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Elizabeth Winstead in a drama about a mismatched young high school students. It was bought at Sundance in January.
I’ve updated the gallery with the first stills of Shailene as Kat Connors in the upcoming thriller White Bird in a Blizzard, directed by Gregg Araki. Hopefully we’ll be seeing and hearing a lot more about the film in coming months.
Kat Connors is 17 years old when her perfect homemaker mother, Eve, a beautiful, enigmatic, and haunted woman, disappears – just as Kat is discovering and relishing her newfound sexuality. Having lived for so long in a stifled, emotionally repressed household, she barely registers her mother’s absence and certainly doesn’t blame her doormat of a father, Brock, for the loss. In fact, it’s almost a relief. But as time passes, Kat begins to come to grips with how deeply Eve’s disappearance has affected her. Returning home on a break from college, she finds herself confronted with the truth about her mother’s departure, and her own denial about the events surrounding it…
Film Productions > White Bird in a Blizzard (2014) > Stills
INDIEWIRE – It looks like SXSW is going to be a bit of Sundance South in 2013. With Park City premieres like “Don Jon’s Addiction,” “Computer Chess,” “Prince Avalanche,” “Before Midnight” and “Upstream Color” all headed to Austin, one more movie that unspooled at the festival is making its way to the city of BBQ.
Zal Batmanglij’s “The East” will be the Closing Night film of the 2013 SXSW Film Festival. It’s familiar territory for the director, who followed a similar trajectory in 2011 with “Sound Of My Voice,” with that film too taking a bow at Sundance and playing SXSW a couple months later. But capping off an exciting week or so of moviegoing is a nice way to return. The film stars Ellen Page, Alexander Skarsgard, Brit Marling and Patricia Clarkson, and tells the story of a young woman who infiltrates a radical environmentalist activist group but finds her moral boundaries becoming blurred.
As we noted in our review, the film is one that should get many people talking, and it seems like a good note to end SXSW on. Meanwhile, even more Sundance titles have also been added to the lineup including James Ponsoldt’s “The Spectacular Now,” docs “Muscle Shoals,” “Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer” and “Linsanity” as well as Ramin Bahrani’s “At Any Price” and many more. Check out the official website for more details. The festival runs from March 8-16.
