Young actor joins Duvall in 'Night in Old Mexico'

Jeremy Irvine (War Horse) will play the grandson to Robert Duvall's grandpa in A Night in Old Mexico, the Bill Wittliff-penned film which we told you about two weeks ago. Latest reports confirm almost all of the filming will be in Brownsville (doubling for Mexico). At one point Austin was looking likely as a shooting location. It's a reteaming of Wittliff and Duvall, who wrote and starred respectively in the TV adaption of Larry McMurty's novel Lonesome Dove.

Is Malick's 'Red Wing' actually 'Marfa Lights' retooled?

UPDATE: No, Red Wing is not in fact Marfa Lights, I am told by a source very much in the know. The film just wrapped.

I told you here two weeks ago about the film Red Wing being shot in the North Texas town of Whitewright with film auteur Terrence Malick's stepson Will Wallace directing. But it took the trades finally reporting on the movie to clue me into the screenwriter behind the project: Kathleen Orillion.

 
What difference does that make? Well, Orillion was also the writer of Marfa Lights,  which producers Malick and Ed Pressman were pushing as the first film from Burnt Orange Productions, a for-profit project of the University of Texas that closed down in 2008. 

When Burnt Orange was set up in 2003, Malick worked with screenwriting students in UT's Michener program to adapt for the screen six works of fiction that had entered the public domain. Orillion adapted George Sand's book Le Petite Fadette into the family saga The Marfa Lights. The novel has a twist. Red Wing's plot has been described as having a twist. Both are small town love stories.

An article in the Dennison, Texas, newspaper seems to bear this out. (Perhaps they had read my blog?)

Oh, and additions to the cast I hadn't previously reported on include Joelle Carter and Fort Worth native Bill Paxton. They join Luke Perry and Frances Fisher.

Rusell Crowe to direct Bill Hicks biopic?

That's the word here, though it's pretty early in the process for the film biography which may start shooting next year. It sounds like a personal project for Russell Crowe, with his pal penning the script. Can Aussie Crowe possibly properly depict the Bill Hicks story of a Houston teen who turned into a comedy cult legend? I'd love feedback on this one. At least Crowe has apparently nixed playing the lead role himself.

Frances Fisher joins Malick-written 'Red Wing'

My sources say Frances Fisher is joining Luke Perry in the cast of Will Wallace-directed Red Wing, which begins shooting in North Texas this next week. Casting notices say it will shoot in Dennison, but there is indication the set may actually be in Whitewright.

The script is from Terrence Malick, Kathleen Orillion. Wallace is best known as an actor and has appeared in his stepfather Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, The Thin Red Line and The New World. Ed Pressman, Malick's partner in Sunflower Films is producing the film.

Fisher went to high school in Orange, Texas.

Long-awaited "Night in Old Mexico' gets greenlight

UPDATE: A major casting call in Brownsville is making it clear the bulk of filming will be in this border town. (This blog post is even mentioned in the local paper.) And it appears Todd Allen's Presidio Pictures is involved in this one.


Bill Wittliff (Lonesome Dove) has been trying to get his script for A Night in Old Mexico before the cameras for so long--dating back to at least the '80s--it's become a legend. Actor Robert Duvall has been pining to star in the film for years. It looks like it's greenlit to finally happen this month in Texas.

The story is about an older man whose ranch is being foreclosed on. He heads with his grandson to Mexico, where they end up in a whorehouse.

It's set to shoot in both Austin and Brownsville (*though at least one reputable source has it entirely in Brownsville) with Spaniard Emilio Aragon directing.

In her book on the Austin film scene, Chainsaws, Slackers and Dykes, Alison Macor talks about how Clint Eastwood was approached in the '90s to star and the late Dennis Hopper was once tapped to direct with Duvall as the lead.

'Boneboys' set to premiere at Fantasia Fest

Montreal's Fantasia Fest bills itsel as the world's largest genre film festival, and Central Texas-shot Boneboys will make its debut there on Aug. 4.

It's a big moment for co-directors Justin Meeks and Duane Graves, whom I first met as a duo with the release of their horror film The Wild Man of the Navidad. The Boneboys script is from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre co-scribe Kim Henkel, whose other life is as a college prof (Graves and Meeks were his students). That's probably why Henkel dubs it a modern take on Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal.

I met Henkel on the Boneboys set in late 2010 and took these photos. He was easy going and seemed to very much enjoy being back living in the Austin area.

Janis Joplin biopic close to actually shooting

This just in from Deadline: Stage actress Nina Arianda will play Texas singing legend Janis Joplin in a film titles either Joplin or The Gospel According to Janis  that concentrates on the last six months of Joplin's life. Sean Durkin, director of the creepily interesting Martha Marcy May Marlene (I finally saw it this past weekend) will helm the Joplin pic, so it could be a very different approach.

It's supposed to start shooting early in 2013 at a budget of about $20 million. This is from the folks who have rights to 21 of her songs.

If I'm remembering right (I am), there were at one time dueling Joplin biopics in the works, so I will truly believe it when I see it. The producers were said to be looking at Philadelphia as a shooting location.