Arnett and Fischer Answer Casting Call

Will Arnett and Jenna Fischer have signed on for supporting roles in two hotly antipated comedies, Semi-Pro and Walk Hard. Arnett will play a sports announcer for Will Ferrell's ill-fated basketball team, while Fischer will play a June Carter type to John C. Reilly's pseudo-Cash in Judd Apatow and Jake and Kasdan's musical biopic spoof. Both films are set for release in 2008.

Arnett has been keeping mad busy since the unfortunate Arrested Development termination, with The Brothers Solomon, Hot Rod, Blades of Glory, and Spring Breakdown all in post-production for release this year. He's also attached to star in Dax Shepard's epic hot-tub-salesmen tale Get 'Em Wet, and as the titular role in Ali G Show writer James Bobin's Jeff the Demon. Last April, it was also announced that he had sold a pitch to DreamWorks for The Ambassador, in which he would star as the son of the Vice President, who makes an ass of himself overseas as an American representative. That one's to be written by Michael Schur, currently writing for the American Office.

Which brings us brack to Office star Fischer, who's currently in the midst of that show's third season, as well as starring in another Reilly vehicle, Quebec, as Seann William Scott's character's wife. She also has small roles in, um, The Brothers Solomon and Blades of Glory. Small world.

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Olivia Goes Nowhere

According to Variety, Eddie Murphy has signed on as the lead in NowhereLand, a new comedy from Paramount Pictures about a man who solves a career crisis by visiting an imaginary world thought up by his daydreaming daughter. Before you shrug it off as another goofy diet-gross-out family comedy in the vein of Doctor Dolittle and Daddy Day Care, keep in mind that the producers specifically chose Murphy based on his late-breakthrough performance in Dreamgirls, and more importantly, keep in mind that it's from the offbeat writing duo of Ed Solomon and Chris Matheson, best known as the creators and writers of the Bill and Ted series.

Variety doesn't mention it, but we're pretty damn sure this is the same project as the previously announced Me and Olivia, which was inspired by Solomon's own kid. Solomon was also attached to direct at that point (he previously directed Billy Bob Thornton in 2003's Levity), but there's no mention of a director in this new development. Matheson has also taken a stab at the chair before, with the underseen sci-fi comedy Evil Alien Conquerors, starring Diedrich Bader and Chris Parnell.

It's great news to see the pair working together again, but it's a poor substitute for any new information on Automatons, their dream project which was in the early stages of development a few years ago but died out without studio support. That little treasure involves two robots who were long ago programmed to kill Adolf Hitler, but got chucked into the ocean after he killed himself, where they continue to this day searching for their target on the sea floor, until Hitler is cloned and put back in action, causing the U.S. government to seek out the droids and let them finish their job. Supposedly, voice over was already recorded, with John C. Reilly and Jack Black as the titular characters, and John Cleese as the Great Dictator. Yes please?

What the Hell is a Wholphin?

The popular literary journal McSweeney's is best known for their regular volumes of frequently hilarious and usually bizarre writings by underground authors and comedians, as well as for their live "happenings" around America that feature readings and performances by popular comedians and musicians. The magazine recently started a new venture, a DVD subscription service called Wholphin. So far, the series has presented original material from the likes of Bob Odenkirk and Alexander Payne. The third disc is out now, and it's filled with interesting oddities, including a Japanese episode of I Dream of Genie, set to new dialogue by Daniel "Lemony Snicket" Handler and others, and a short film by Miguel Arteta of Chuck and Buck and The Good Girl, written by Me and You and Everyone We Know's Miranda July, and starring July, John C. Reilly, and Mike White. And finally, it apparently features Patton Oswalt "staring into the camera for five minutes." You can't find that at Blockbuster.

Wholphin will release a new disc each quarter, and can only be gotten here.

And if you were wondering, a wholphin is totally real and happens when a dolphin and a whale get Biblical.

Hard Times Ahead for John C. Reilly

Jake Kasdan's previously announced Walk Hard will begin filming in January. Kasdan and his former Freaks and Geeks collaborator Judd Apatow co-wrote the script, which will star John C. Reilly as folk star Dewey Cox. Reilly will sing himself, as he did in Chicago and A Prairie Home Companion.

Kasdan recently finished The TV Set, which is slated for theaters next April. Apatow has more projects in the works than the Comedyblog has room to name.

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