For all the jokes Ben Affleck received as a result of his one-time romance with J.Lo, not to mention his flops like Paycheck and Surviving Christmas, the actor has been able to turn his fortunes around by retooling his image. In his other career, Affleck may have been Hollywood’s next big thing, but now he’s respected more for his pair of Boston crime flicks, Gone Baby Gone and The Town, more than anything else. The actor is so on top right now that he’s going to play the male lead opposite Rachel McAdams in Terrence Malick’s next feature that’s tentatively slated for 2012.
However, Affleck hasn’t forgotten about directing. If anything he’s more concentrated on his latest project than anything else. Warner Bros. were looking at him to direct Superman: The Man of Steel before going with Zach Synder. Baz Lurhmann’s courted him to play Tom Buchanan in his 3-D version of The Great Gatsby, to which he declined. (The part went to Joel Edgerton.) Instead he’s mulling his next project, Argo, to be produced by George Clooney and Grant Heslov. Affleck will leave Boston for the Middle East in this fact-based tale about a CIA plan to rescue diplomats from Tehran after the 1979 Iranian revolution by claiming that they were part of a Hollywood movie crew. Still in the pre-production stage, Affleck has got his first star of the film.
Variety reports that Alan Arkin has signed on to play the role of Lester Siegel. Siegel is a former O.S.S. spy, now a movie producer, described as “equal parts bookie and rabbi.” That’s sounds right up Arkin’s alley. While he got a supporting Oscar for Little Miss Sunshine, he also had memorable turns in The Rocketeer, Edward Scissorhands, Sunshine Cleaning (pictured above) and of course, Glengarry Glen Ross. From the looks of it, Argo will be lighter in tone compared to Affleck’s crime thrillers. The project almost seems comparable to a little-seen 2004 comedy called The Last Shot with Matthew Broderick and Alec Baldwin. Only instead of mixing a faux movie crew with a CIA mission involving the rescue of diplomats, it revolved around a faux movie project, the FBI and a mob sting operation. Look for Argo to lens soon once the rest of the casting has been announced.
