With filming set to kick off this month, director Jonathan Liebesman and outspoken producer Michael Bay are picking up speed gathering the necessary actors for what is apparently still called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. With April O’Neil and the four main characters cast, the filmmakers have tracked down someone to embody their ninja master, talking rat Splinter. Seinfeld/Watchmen’s Danny Woodburn will be slipping into a performance capture suit for the job.
Megan Fox is aboard as April, while Alan Ritchson, Pete Ploszek, Noel Fisher and Jeremy Howard are set as Raphael, Leonardo, Michelangelo and Donatello. Oh, and Will Arnett is aboard in an unspecified role.
Given that Splinter is usually portrayed as Asian, we’re not sure if Woodburn will be taking voice duties as well as providing the performance, but there’s always a chance that Liebesman and co are going another way with the role.
As for the title, the film was briefly pimped during Paramount’s CinemaCon presentation on Monday but, as nothing has been shot yet, the only mention was the name, which appears, at least for now, to be the full original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rather than simply an acronym. It remains to be seen whether the whole modified origin story, with the Turtles as aliens instead of mutated Earth amphibians, which caused so much fan outrage, is still in place.
We can expect the movie to hit our cinemas in 3D on August 15 next year.