Whatever you think about Hollywood's constant fascination with rewriting history, the idea of
Russell Brand as a reinvention of Dudley Moore's
Arthur has to be hailed as casting genius. While it may whiff a little of Rob Sneider syndrome (Russell Brand as Russell Brand in another Russell Brand presentation) there are a number of intriguing factors bubbling away. First came the
leaked pictures of the Batmobile a few weeks ago before Brand and co-star
Luis Guzman appeared in caped-crusader and faithful sidekick get-up, and now we have pictures of another spoof showing, this time in the form of the
DeLorean on set. Spoofing is all well and good - unless it's Not Another Spoof Movie while a string of meaningless nods just leaves the audience feeling empty, cold and wishing they'd waited for Love Film. The good news on that front is that the screenwriter is none other than
Peter Baynham, Sacha Baron Cohen's collaborator on both
Borat and
Brüno and scribe of notorious TV comedies
The Day Today and
Brass Eye. As we've seen form the leaked pictures, the tale is in for a complete revamp of the original, and with a well-cast Brand and co-stars of
Helen Mirren (taking John Gielgud's role from the original) and
Greta Gerwig (Greenberg) - the picture is suddenly looking like it could be somewhere close to an absolute hoot. Dusted with a helping of
Jennifer Garner and
Nick Nolte, there could be icing on the cake yet. Arthur's set for an undetermined 2011 release.