The Hollywood Reporter: Risky Business

Congratulations, it's a little Focker

By Steven Zeitchik

It looks like "Little Fockers" is finally coming of age.

The long-gestating third installment of the comedy franchise is maturing quickly at Universal — but with new parents.

John Hamburg has been brought on to write the screenplay after Larry Stuckey penned an earlier draft. 

The Endeavor-repped Hamburg is a Ben Stiller collaborator who did drafts on "Meet the Parents" and “Meet the Fockers" and worked with the star on "Along Came Polly." He also wrote and directed the comedy "I Love You, Man," set for release next month via Paramount.

Meanwhile, Jay Roach, who of course directed the first two films and had been loosely attached to direct this one, will not helm the picture. The hyphenate is concentrating on the comic romp “Dinner for Schmucks” for DreamWorks and Parkes/Bowles and only will produce “Fockers.”

Producers instead are out to a handful of top comedy directors and hope to close a deal imminently.

Among the candidates said to be in the running are comedy veteran Paul Weitz, who wrote and directed “In Good Company” and co-wrote and co-directed “About a Boy”; the quirky-comedy figure David Wain, writer-director of cult pic “Wet Hot American Summer” and Universal’s male-buddy hit “Role Models”; and Peyton Reed, who directed the current Jim Carrey starrer “Yes Man.”

After some slowed momentum, Universal and Tribeca Prods. are, sources said, moving forward quickly on the project, with an eye toward shooting as early as summer or fall.

On the casting side, Stiller, Robert De Niro and Owen Wilson — the last of whom had unrelated small parts in the first two pics as an ex-fiance and a minister, respectively, but could have an expanded role here — are in negotiations to star in “Fockers.”

The “Fockers” franchise of course stars Stiller as a liberal, do-no-right husband and De Niro as his conservative, unforgiving father-in-law. “Little Fockers” is expected to revolve around the children of Stiller and Teri Polo, who plays his wife.

The property has provided a reliable cash infusion for Universal, with the first two pics earning more than $800 million worldwide.

But after the sequel “Meet the Fockers” came out in 2004, development encountered some hiccups. The “Little Fockers” project was announced two years ago with Roach protege Stuckey writing the script but until recently had not gained sufficient traction to move forward. Now? A baby may finally be on the way.

Reporters Loving Reporters: The Frost/Nixon Story

By Steven Zeitchik

Get ready to read a lot of favorable pieces about "Frost/Nixon." That's not because the movie is flawless (it's good, with strong performances and cultural tonalities and a powerful sense of justice, but not flawless), but because no movie flatters the press like this one.

You have to go back to 90's entertainments like "The Paper" to see even traces of this kind of moral elevation, and all the way back to "All the President's Men" to find a heroism so comprehensive. Most journalistic movies in the past thirty years have been informed by more cynical conceptions: opportunism, ("The Insider"), naivete ("Absence of Malice") cheating ("Shattered Glass") shallowness ("The Devil Wears Prada"),
and all of the above ("Broadcast News")

A quick summary on F/N: The movie, based on Peter Morgan's play, takes a look at the verbal sparring -- more like a lopsided UFC match until the inevitable final-round comeback -- between Richard Nixon and David Frost in the months shortly after Nixon's resignation. But the real drama is between Frost and his team, the former of whom comes from a slick talk-show background and the latter of which are relentless (though not entirely humorless) truthseekers.

The movie, like so many about journalism, understands reporting as a mix of detective work and cross-examination, not as a quest for revelation and information. The great achievement comes when Frost corners Nixon, like some kind of debate-team champion,  into a confession, and the coup de grace is pulled off with some kind of muddy investigative triumph (the smoking gun was in federal papers...the...whole...time)

No matter. Frost wins his battle, and the team, which includes the righteous James Reston Jr. in Sam Rockwell's best turn in a long time, is celebrated not just onscreen but through viewer catharsis.

The timing couldn't be better for such a message of uplift. Journalists, you may have noticed, are taking a beating on all fronts. There's Sarah Palin, telling us how she'd rather go directly to the American people instead of through pesky and unnecessary filters; they just get in the way. There's the Tribune company, cutting meat and bone and the entire animal. And then there's all the media itself telling us, tendentiously, how all the other media is too tendentious to listen to.

Amid all this, what could be more comforting than a reminder -- no, a celebration -- of a time when journalists mattered, when they didn't just have the courage of their convictions but used those convictions to topple leaders, and were celebrated as rock stars for doing so. At the Westside media screening we attended Tuesday evening, there was knowing, sometimes showy, laughter to many of the media jokes, vocal reminders that the many press in the audience Get It and will happily crow about this movie to show that they Get It.

When "Sideways" made its unlikely run to awards and box-office glory four yeas ago, it did so on the backs of critics drawn to Paul Giamatti's inner critic and curmudgeon. Print  and broadcast reporters will be similarly enthused to see such glowing versions of themselves.