Zach Galifianakis Drops R.I.P.D To Run For President in SOUTHERN RIVALS

Any project is always going to be weakened when a talent like Zach Galifianakis exits but one particularly feels R.I.P.D. (Rest In Peace Department) will suffer, a PG-13 supernatural buddy cop movie centering on a pair of deceased detectives, one of which is a gunslinger from the Wild West! Ryan Reynolds has long been attached as the straight-man lead as the recently murdered cop but it's the wacky gunslinger role that only few in Hollywood could go all out and play and Galifanakis was one. Finding a replacement who can make this concept work with only weeks before filming begins in Boston is an unenviable task but I'll throw two names in the ring for the sake of it; Ron Perlman and Bruce Campbell! But Hollywood will undoubtedly want someone more marketable. I mentioned in a post last night that if Ryan Reynolds was ever going to make Fox's X-Men spin-off of the Marvel superhero Deadpool, it would have to be now with a director newly attached and Galifianakis' exiting should make things interesting... a nice tester to see how much he wants to make R.I.P.D. Robert Schwentke (Red, Flightplan) is attached to helm the supernatural comedy based on the Peter Lenkov/Dark Horse comic that has a feeling of Ghostbusters and Hellboy about it. Meanwhile, Galifianakis has decided his next movie will be Southern Rivals, a political comedy at Warner Bros which will find him teaming up Will Ferrell and director Jay Roach (Dinner For Schmucks) and writers Chris Henchy (The Other Guys) and Shawn Harwell (HBO€™s Eastbound & Down) for a movie about two Presidential rivals, said to be timed for release close to the next US elections in 2012. Not much is known just yet about the pitch but presumably the actors will play fictional characters, in a post-Obama America, who the candidates are trying to oust. Either Obama or a fictional Black President who is supposed to be Obama anyway. Sounds like it could be a classic... and Roach rarely lets us down. I loved the absurdity and utter lunacy of Dinner For Schmucks and would expect much the same here.
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Matt Holmes is the co-founder of What Culture, formerly known as Obsessed With Film. He has been blogging about pop culture and entertainment since 2006 and has written over 10,000 articles.