New Line's remake of the 1979 George Burns comedy Going In Style already has Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine attached to star. Now the final member of the lead trio may have arrived. Dustin Hoffman is in talks to make up the third piece of the puzzle.
The original film starred Burns, Art Carney and Lee Strasberg as bored Brooklyn senior citizens who hatch a plan to rob a bank. They pull off the caper wearing Groucho Marx disguises and then significantly increase their earnings with some casino luck. Their story becomes a media cause célèbre, but ill health and killjoy cops put a dampener on their adventures.
Theodore Melfi (St. Vincent) was originally lined up to direct, but has apparently moved on, although we still seem to be talking about his screenplay. Oddly, Variety reports that New Line are looking at Zach Braff (Garden State, Wish I Was Here) as his replacement, but "negotiations are not underway". So Braff is top of a wishlist, rather than a locked-in player.
Following the likes of Last Vegas (which also starred Freeman) and Grudge Match, grumpy-old-men comedies seem to be quietly in vogue in Hollywood at the moment. A Hoffman-Caine-Freeman version could be fun, but there's no start date so far.