Slow News Day: Fatty Black, Pregnant Poehler, Hawaiian Freak, Preview Pie

ITEM: Jack Black is the latest actor to join Ben Stiller's Tropic Thunder, playing an overweight comedian named "Fats." One can only hope the movie's other jokes play on a slightly higher level.

ITEM: Austin Powers scribe Michael McCullens will make his directing debut with Baby Mama, in which Tina Fey hires Amy Poehler as a baby surrogate to avoid taking maternity leave. Hopefully that promising casting can eclipse the dumb-ass title, not to mention the plot, which is not only bland and predictable, but also strangely similar to SNL co-star Will Forte's recently wrapped script for The Brothers Solomon.

ITEM: Jason Segel, still best known as the lovelorn drummer of Freaks and Geeks, has lined up his first leading film role in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a romantic comedy about a guy who decides to get over his break-up blues with a Hawaiian vacation, only to find his ex traveling to the same island with her new beau. Kristin Bell of Veronica Mars will play the titular role. How did Segel land the gig after years of wacky sidekick background acting? Well, he wrote it himself.

ITEM: The anticipated dramedy Waitress, written and directed by the late Hal Hartley protege Adrienne Shelly, finally has a trailer up. Unfortunately, it looks like an obnoxious, cutesy retread of every other uber-Southern indie flick you've ever seen, but will hopefully be saved by the comic talents of Nathan Fillion and Cheryl Hines.

Matt Besser Walks With Me

Fellow comedy reporters The Coming have posted an info-packed interview with Matt Besser, who has been keeping himself so busy that we can't stop posting features about him. Among the major revelations is that he'll be playing the guitarist in John C. Reilly's faux hit band in Jake Kasdan and Judd Apatow's biopic spoof Walk Hard, and that he's Kanye West's official improv coach for his upcoming untitled HBO mockumentary created by Larry Charles. Futhermore, he's writing a new film called Safety First for pal Amy Poehler.

Meanwhile, the Upright Citizens Brigade just finished a weekend of filming for a new Shout! Factory DVD release of ASSSSCAT 3000, which previously failed to catch on as a Bravo series. The four taped specials featured all four UCBers, as well as Horatio Sanz, Chad Carter, Sean Conroy, and Andrew Daly, plus improv-launching monologues from Will Arnett, Tom Lennon, Ed Helms, Paul F. Tompkins, and Jen Kirkman. Besser hopes the DVD will do well enough to kick off a sort of UCB/Shout! Factory imprint label where they can release even more footage from their various live output. He also announces that they're working on a new UCB website to feature daily videos and more.

All in all, a pretty good way to stick it to Comedy Central for canceling one of the best sketch comedy shows of all time, don't you think?

Matt Besser Explains UCB Delays, Wants Your Songs

The Upright Citizens Brigade's Matt Besser has a new MySpace page, which he promises to pack full of new exclusive videos such as the Catching Friends webisodes, where MySpace Tom explains how to attract friends to your profile by lying about your interests. More importantly, he's provided information on the status of the second season of the UCB's sketch comedy show, and the entirely improvised UCB movie, Wild Girls Gone. Both of these projects have been in limbo for a long, long time, so this should cause a giant sigh of relief for fans of the alternative comedy troupe.

Comedy Central will release Upright Citizens Brigade: The Complete Second Season this fall, and Besser has put out an APB for fan-created music to be part of the DVD extras. The new collection comes not a moment too soon, since the first season has been out for over three years. Presumably the third and final season won't take nearly as long.

He also explains that Wild Girls Gone, which was filmed about a billion years ago, has been in a long, painful editing process to whittle down the enormous amounts of footage they shot, and could finally see a release as early as this summer. The film stars Besser, Matt Walsh, Ian Roberts, and Amy Poehler in a story of a small-town dance contest that gets mixed up with a start-up amateur porn video. It also features a laundry list of up-and-comers that UCB Theatre visitors should be more than familiar with, including Rob Riggle, Andrew Daly, Rob Huebel, Danielle Schneider, John Ross Bowie, and Jamie Denbo. There's no word on theatrical distribution, but Besser says they're prepared to sell the DVD directly through their website.

Besser will also be seen alongside Chris Kattan and Brian Posehn later this year in Undead or Alive, playing the sheriff in an Old West town plagued by zombies.

A Trailer in Glorious HD

IGN has posted the first trailer for Blades of Glory, starring Will Ferrell and Jon Heder as two solo figure skaters who are banned from the game after fighting, but return to competition through a loophole that allows them to perform as a couple, pitting them against champion skating couple Will Arnett and Amy Poehler. So...go watch that.

No, you're not losing it, that was indeed William "Mr. Feeny" Daniels as the figure skating commissioner, and Craig T. "Coach Fox" Nelson as the skating coach.

Also, Ain't it Cool News has posted a positive but enormously vague review of an early screening of the movie, which hits theaters March 30.

Spongepoehler

Nickelodeon is reportedly upping the ante on original productions, thanks to the continuing financial and critical success of Spongebob Squarepants, and comedy fans get to reap the benefits, since Amy Poehler is among their new recruits. Mighty B, which will premiere in 2007, features Poehler as Bessie Higgenbottom, the most zealous of all her Girl Scout troop, who call themselves the Honeybees, in a reference that goes all the way back to the first episode of Upright Citizens Brigade.

Chances that her UCB partners or her funny-ass husband will show up in repeated guest spots? Very good to certain.

Poehler will soon be seen on screens in Spring Breakdown, Blades of Glory, and the troubled Southland Tales.

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