Candy Land, GL, Nannerl, Nolan, and Dollhouse

Here it is, my not quite periodical post on the various entertainment news items that have caught my interest recently.

Universal Pictures is developing a live-action movie based on the Candy Land board game (Variety). I remember playing this game as a little kid, though I have played it as recently as last December (I was babysitting my boss's six-year-old son for some extra Christmas cash). I wonder what the movie will be like... I hope it'll have a dash of Tim Burton-esque weirdness to cut the sweet (as long as it doesn't turn out like Strawberry Shortcake...). Etan Cohen (Madagascar 2, Tropic Thunder) will write the script, and Kevin Lima (Enchanted) is set to direct. This is the latest confection to come out of last February's Universal-Hasbro deal to turn at least four of Hasbro's toy properties into movies (Variety). So far, I've heard that Monopoly, Battleship, and Ouija movies are also in the works, though luckily I've heard nothing about a Stretch Armstrong movie... yet.

Martin Campbell, who recently directed Casino Royale, is in negotiations to direct Warner Bros.' live-action Green Lantern movie (Variety). DC superhero movies have had trouble maintaining support in recent years (with one big exception), so we'll see if the current top DC movie projects--the other being Jonah Hex, which has Josh Brolin attached to star--can manage to get made. I'm not a particular GL fan, but I like the DC characters in general and would like to see more comic book movies.

A biopic about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's sister, Nannerl, will be made with Rene Feret set to direct (IMDb). This is mainly relevant to me because in my class's fourth grade play, I was Nannerl. This play was a kiddie musical called "Of Mice and Mozart", which tells the story of Mozart entirely in couplet rhymes (easy for kids to remember, annoying for parents to listen to), narrated by the mice who lived in the woodwork of Mozart's house. I took great pride in my role, mainly because I was one of two people in the whole fourth grade who did not have to wear either mouse ears or a goofy cotton ball wig for the play. I sang a handful of songs, but my only speaking lines were these:
Hello, everyone, Nannerl is my name.
Being Wolfgang's sister is my claim to fame.
I also love music and never get bored
For I spend hours playing my clavichord.
If you think it's odd that I remember that, ask me to recite my lines from my third-grade play. Anyway... yeah, it's about time Nannerl got a little respect with her own biopic.

After the astounding commercial and critical success of The Dark Knight, one might expect a sequel to be rushed to the head of Warner Bros.' slate. But Christopher Nolan has yet to commit--I would imagine he wants to make sure any sequel will be done right; Dark Knight is a tough act to follow. In the meantime, Warner Bros. has secured Nolan to direct his own script "Inception" (Variety). The studio describes it as contemporary sci-fi action. I'm certainly interested to learn more about Nolan's next project.

Joss Whedon's new show Dollhouse premiered last Friday with reasonable but not great audience numbers (Variety). The fact that it was the No. 1-downloaded TV show on iTunes on Monday doesn't mean much to the studios who make much more money from advertisers that want over-the-air viewers. I enjoyed last week's Dollhouse--I think it's smart, fun, and unique, and I hope that it will be able to continue its run. To do that, it needs the ratings. So watch Dollhouse tomorrow! On Fox Friday at 9/8c.