Sports commentator and podcaster Bill Simmons recently had an interview with Jason Reitman, which you can download here. For an hour they talk the Golden Globes, movies, the Lakers and hockey. During the interview Reitman makes mention of two upcoming projects. The first is an adaptation of Joyce Maynard’s recent novel Labor Day, which will be his next. He also has an idea for a hockey referee movie. I have a feeling the second picture won’t be the hockey equivalent of Forget Paris with Billy Crystal and Debra Winger.
Now with Labor Day the story involves Henry, a 13-year-old social outcast, and his heartbroken mom as they’re willingly taken hostage by an escaped convict in their own home.
Digging further at Amazon.com, the novel has the pathos of Ian McEwan’s Atonement and Nick Horby’s About a Boy, and Joyce Maynard weaves a beautiful, poignant tale of love, sex, adolescence, and devastating treachery as seen through the eyes of a young teenage boy—and the man he later becomes—looking back at an unexpected encounter that begins one single long, hot, life-altering weekend.
Sounds right up Reitman’s alley, in An Education–Stand By Me sort of way.
The acclaimed writer-director notes that when it comes to hockey movies, Slapshot pretty much ruined it for all other attempts at the genre. “Like Bull Durham does for baseball or Hoosiers and White Men Can’t Jump do for basketball.” If Reitman follows through with the comedy, he’ll be second to writer-director Kevin Smith who is also getting his own hockey comedy (Hit Somebody) off the ground, and it may star Wil “Gordie Lachance” Wheaton! Maybe Reitman should go after Gordie’s older brother (John Cusack), or maybe Vern (Jerry O’Connell). Eh, who am I kidding. Reitman needs to go after Wheaton’s other Toy Soldiers, Sean Austin and Keith Coogan.
Oh, and if you listen to the podcast long enough, Reitman also talks about Up in the Air and how the film would have been altered if the director couldn’t get his dream star George Clooney. Without going into great detail, here’s a hint: Ryan Bingham could have been a “jerk” struggling with “parenthood.”
Credit: The Sports Guy
