Buried in a Deadline Hollywood story about Robert De Niro's representation (he's just moved from the William Morris Agency back to his old home at Creative Artists) are some snippets about his upcoming roles.
Frustratingly there are no details, other than the brief, tantalising mention that it's in "mid development", about a new Midnight Run, but** the prospect of De Niro returning to Jack Walsh, one of his funniest screen creations, is a doozy. **
Paul Weitz' Another Night in Suck City, co-starring Casey Affleck, is based on a memoir by Nick Flynn (Another Bullshit Night in Suck City) at the centre of which is a fractured father/son relationship. De Niro as Affleck's father?** **
And Selma, by** Precious director Lee Daniels, **will see De Niro take on the mantle of George Wallace. Not the comedian (he's not quite that versatile) but the governor of Alabama and four-time presidential candidate. Wallace was vehemently in favour of keeping his state racially segregated, provoking Martin Luther King's famous marches between Selma and Montgomery, Alabama in the early 1960s. He offered his apologies to black civil rights leaders when he became a born-again Christian in the late 1970s.
Sounds like it could potentially be De Niro's heaviest role for a while (Deadline Hollywood calls it "showy") so we're looking forward to hearing who'll be up against him as Dr King. Any ideas?