Has any film gone through more A-list flip-flopping than Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity? First Angelina Jolie was attached to the project before quickly dropping it. Next, Robert Downey Jr. was cast as the male lead. Then there was some suggestion of Scarlett Johansson taking on the lead female role, before Natalie Portman entered the scene. Following that, Portman turned down the offer and Sandra Bullock went into negotiations. Most recently, Robert Downey Jr. was forced to drop out due to scheduling issues. Got all of that? Good, because here comes another big name.
THR reports that George Clooney has officially come on-board to take Downey Jr.'s place as the male lead in Gravity. As mentioned in previous reports, the female character plays a much larger role than the man, but the secondary part is still important in the first half of the film. In the film, Bullock and Clooney will play astronauts working as part of a space exploration team who are the only survivors after their space station is decimated in a horrific accident. The two are stranded out in space with no means of contact. The studio expects the film to begin shooting next spring, after Clooney has finished directing his next project, The Ides of March.
I truly don't understand why it's taken so long to get actors set for this film. After all, we're talking about the director of Children of Men, one of the best films of the last decade. Regardless, it's nice to see that the casting has finally settled and this project can actually get going. If the film is truly as ambitious as it seems to be, we may be in for a real treat.
