Today's Film News: Knoxville is a Fruitcake

By Katey Rich

John Waters may be the only guy left in Hollywood (or Baltimore, for that matter) who will cast former Jackass star Johnny Knoxville, but given Waters' wacky and wonderful tastes, that might not be a bad thing. Knoxville and Parker Posey will star in Fruitcake, Waters' first effort at a Christmas movie. I'll just lift the plot description from The Hollywood Reporter, since it's pretty hard to beat: "The plot is officially under wraps but is said to center on the title character, a boy named after his favorite dessert. He runs away from home during the holidays after he and his parents are caught shoplifting meat, then meets up with a runaway girl raised by two gay men and searching for her birth mother." Yep, that sounds like a John Waters Christmas to me.

Two actors who are pretty much always described as "promising young stars," Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel, will team up in 500 Days of Summer, an "anti-romantic comedy" about a woman who doesn't believe in love and the man who, naturally, falls head over heels for her. The Reporter writes that Marc Webb, who has previously made music videos, will make his directing debut with the script by Scott Neustadter and Michael M. Weber.

Heather Graham has spent a lot of time lately making indies that no one actually sees (Gray Matters, Adrift in Manhattan), and she may be keeping at it with her role in Ex-Terminators. She'll star along Jennifer Coolidge and Amber Heard, reports Variety, all playing women who meet in therapy and start a very unusual type of business. Something tells me that punny title isn't referring to creepy crawlies, but creepy men.

And finally, Nancy Meyers, who has made grown-up style romantic comedies like Something's Gotta Give and The Holiday, is set to direct her next film at Universal, having made the previous two at Sony. Variety writes that the movie is, yes, a romantic comedy, and it concerns a long-term marriage, with big parts for one woman and two men. Universal set a new standard for romantic comedy last summer with Knocked Up, so it'll be interesting if Meyers can turn the studio into a two-headed beast-- Seth Rogen on one side, Kate Winslet on the other. Oh what a beast that would be.