Remember Michael Scott and Holly Flax? Of course you do. They were the only couple (aside from maybe Ryan and Kelly) on The Office that you didn’t grow to resent. I’m projecting a bit here, but Steve Carell and Amy Ryan did a bang-up job on the NBC series and they’ll soon be aligning forces once again for something a bit bleaker.
Deadline reports that Ryan has joined the cast of the Steve Carell drug-addiction drama Beautiful Boy. There’s still a relationship factor, mind you. It just might be as storybook as The Office.
Ryan will play Vicki, Nic’s mother and the ex-wife of Carell’s David, who was cut out of her son’s life after David won primary custody. She begins to work with David for the sake of Nic’s health.
Based on David Sheff’s 2008 book Beautiful Boy: A Father’s Journey Through His Son’s Addiction, the film currently has Belgian filmmaker Felix van Groeningen attached to direct and will be shepherded by Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment.
It’s all subject to the quality of the finished product, but Beautiful Boy sounds like awards nip. Acclaimed actors, weighty subject matter, a respected Belgian director and drug sadness? The festival circuit will embrace this with open arms.
(Via Deadline)
