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Mel Gibson and Sean Penn are both actors that tend to divide opinion among movie fans, but with two Academy Awards each, you can’t deny that they’re among the finest talents of their generation, regardless of how you feel about their personal beliefs or opinions. So throw them together in a prestige drama about the creation of the dictionary and you’ve got… well, you’ve got something that will interest some people a lot more than others.
The Professor and the Madman is a biographical period drama that stars Gibson as the former and Penn as the latter, which is admittedly simplifying things an awful lot. The Lethal Weapon star plays Professor James Murray, who undergoes the arduous task of compiling the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary in the 1870s. Gathering up the definition for every word in existence is no easy task, but one helpful fellow submits over 10,000 entries, only for it to be revealed that the generous contributor is a patient in a lunatic asylum.
All the ingredients were there for fairly transparent Oscar bait, and Gibson was even set to direct at one stage before handing the reins over to Farhad Safinia, who scripted his jaw-dropping action thriller Apocalypto. However, Safinia ended up taking a credit under the pseudonym of P.B. Sherman after a series of legal issues saw the director and two stars disown the final product completely.
As a result, The Professor and the Madman sat on the shelf for close to three years before being dumped onto VOD, and it arrives on Netflix next month on December 15th, where it could either be the latest surprising entry in the Top 10 most-watched list or completely sink without a trace.
He’s only just finished shooting action movie Red Notice, but Ryan Reynolds has already got another pic cooking with Netflix. The Deadpool star is reuniting with Shawn Levy, director of upcoming Reynolds vehicle Free Guy, for sci-fi action/adventure The Adam Project, and Deadline reports today that he’ll be joined on the film by Zoe Saldana and Jennifer Garner.
Plot details are currently being kept under wraps, but the basic logline has been revealed and we know that Reynolds will star as a man who travels back in time when he needs help from his 13-year-old self. Netflix snapped up The Adam Project following Paramount deciding to pass on it as they’re figuring out their release schedule admist the pandemic. And given Reynolds and Stranger Things producer Levy’s past association with the streamer, Deadline notes that Netflix is the perfect home for it.
The Adam Project will be the first film for the Deadpool star’s newest brainchild, The Group Effort Initiative, a self-financed diversity and inclusion program that aims to give people of color a chance to work and learn the craft on his productions. Reynolds is also producing the movie through his Maximum Effort banner, while Levy will co-produce through 21 Laps Entertainment. Jonathan Tropper (This is Where I Leave You) provides the script.
Like Reynolds and Levy, Saldana and Garner also have a pre-established relationship with Netflix, too. Garner will be next seen starring in, as well as producing, the upcoming movie Yes Day, while Saldana is set to lead and exec produce the limited series From Scratch for the streamer.
The Adam Project is just the latest project on the slate for Ryan Reynolds, of course, and joins The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, Shotgun Wedding, a new Clue adaptation and several more. He’ll next be heard in animation The Croods 2: A New Age, though, coming this Thanksgiving.