Paramount Pictures has finally found their Ren McCormack, after Chase Crawford dropped out of the role. Thing is, the role has gone to a no-name! Newcomer Kenny Wormald won the role after a worldwide search!

Wormald, a Boston native, appeared in the MTV series Dancelife and recently toured with Justin Timberlake. He will join Dancing with the Stars alum Julianne Hough, who will play Ariel, and Dennis Quaid, who joins the cast in the role of Reverend Moore. Writer/director Craig Brewer (Hustle & Flow) will helm the project that he rewrote after Zac Efron and director Kenny Ortega dropped out of the famed 1980s remake last year.

This could be a star-making role for Wormald, as Ren McCormack was for Kevin Bacon back in 1984. Veteran producer Craig Zadan, who produced the original, will also produce the remake. The movie will feature choreography from Jamal Sims, who most recently worked with Madonna on her Sticky & Sweet tour, and will next work for Neil Patrick Harris on his production of Rent at the Hollywood Bowl.

Says Brewer, “I can promise Footloose fans that I will be true to the spirit of the original film. But I still gotta put my own Southern grit into it and kick it into 2011.”

Paramount has set April 1, 2011 for the film’s release. Production is set to begin in August.

Source

Finally, some good news for Sandra Bullock.

More than 3 million copies of The Blind Side have been sold since its March 23 release, making it the top-selling DVD this week, according to sales and rental data released Wednesday night.

Bullock, 45, earned a best actress Oscar for playing Leanne Tuohy in the feel-good flick, which earned $255 million in theaters.

Just a week after earning the Academy Award, though, Michelle McGee announced that she’d had an 11-month affair with Bullock’s husband of nearly five years, Jesse James. (Tuohy was one of the few people Bullock spoke to in the days after learning of her husband’s alleged indiscretions.)

McGee’s dad, Denny, said she grew infuriated after seeing James and Bullock together at the awards show.

“She was under the impression they weren’t seeing each other. She felt [betrayed]… she felt like she was going to have a relationship and this happened and she was mad,” he said.

The new issue of Us Weekly, on stands now, reports that Bullock “has made up her mind” to divorce James. “She is over him,” the friend says.

Bullock has spoken to James very little in recent weeks.

“When they do talk, it’s very little and very nasty,” the friend explains. “She won’t forgive him for this.”

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Warner Bros. Pictures and production company Atlas Entertainment are developing a feature film based on CBS’ “Gilligan’s Island.”

Charles Roven and Richard Suckle will produce for Atlas, with Brad Copeland writing the screenplay. Original show producer Sherwood Schwartz is on board to executive produce along with son Lloyd Schwartz.

Variety says that plans are for a contemporary take on the iconic show. They’re hoping to start production next year but won’t move forward on seeking a director or cast until Copeland’s script is completed.

“The characters are so good,” Roven added. “We think it’s going to be a great story to transport these cultural icons to the modern day.”

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Dancing queens everywhere, dust off your satin disco bodysuits and get ready to hit the local movie theater once again. A sequel to the hugely successful $600,000,000-grossing movie ‘Mamma Mia’ is in the works with sources reporting new songs penned by the legendary ABBA songwriting team.

“The first movie was such a hit that Meryl Streep and most of the original cast have already signed on to make part 2. However, the problem is the score,” one producer said. “Most of the great ABBA hits have already been used in the first film, so the great songwriting team looks like its going to get together to write more fantastic tunes.”

Bring it on, I loved ‘Mamma Mia’!!

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Mel Gibson’s new movie is already causing controversy in Mexico – relatives of inmates at a Veracruz jail have blasted plans to move prisoners to make way for the film shoot.

The Hollywood actor-turned-director has set his sights on filming at the Ignacio Allende prison in the eastern coastal city.

Veracruz state governor, Fidel Herrera Beltran, announced earlier this month that prisoners would be moved out of the jail to allow the film crew to work there.

Authorities previously planned to transfer inmates to a new prison in the town next year – but families fear their loved ones will be sent to facilities across the country if the jail is not built in time.

Hundreds of family members launched demonstrations outside the prison on Monday in a bid to stop the transfers until the new unit is ready. The 24-hour protest reportedly came to an end on Tuesday after the prison’s director announced he had received no orders to transfer inmates and vowed families would be informed if any prisoners are to be moved.

Gibson previously filmed his 2006 epic Apocalypto in Veracruz and subsequently handed local authorities a $1 million donation to help build new homes for victims of 2005′s Hurricane Stan.

Source, Bauer-Griffin

So how many of you went and saw Avatar this weekend? I tried to go see it last night, and the line was so long, I couldn’t even see the end! I’m hoping to sneak out this week and see it during the day. If you saw it – let me know what you thought! I’m really curious!

From Entertainment Weekly:

After months of breathless buzz, speculation, and doubt, James Cameron’s Avatar finally arrived in movie theaters nationwide, and its box office prognosis definitely isn’t blue. The 3-D sci-fi epic landed at number one with an estimated $73 million, according to Hollywood.com Box Office. The number is certainly on the lower end of expectations for the long-anticipated film, but considering that much of the east coast was buried under record snowfall for most of the weekend, it remains an unambiguously solid opening — the best 3-D debut ever and the second-best December debut behind I Am Legend. Also unambiguous: The film’s rock-solid “A” CinemaScore rating, which, along with the raves currently streaming across Twitter and inundating message boards (like this one), suggests it will grow long legs at the box office well into the new year. (It’s no wonder that IMAX screenings of the film reportedly sold-out every single seat.) Worldwide, the picture’s already banked an estimated $232.2 million.

The Los Angeles Times received an update from Frank Miller about his follow-up to 300, which earned $456 million in theaters worldwide.

Miller says the new project, now titled Xerxes, begins about 10 years before the events of 300, and Zack Snyder has expressed interest in it as a film property as well. “It’s the battle of Marathon through my lens,” Miller said. “I’ve finished the plot and I’m getting started on the artwork.”

Miller said that during his research trips to Greece he realized that the myth and history overlap begins to blur, which adds to the storytelling allure. “The fact and the myth are inseparable and, believe me, when you go sailing for a while in the Aegean Sea, you start believing in Poseidon.”

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