Carrey to star in Ripley movie
2005-11-30 08:24
Los Angeles - Hollywood superstar Jim Carrey is to play the founder of the Ripley's Believe It Or Not chronicle of oddities in a new movie to be directed by Tim Burton, the entertainment press said on Tuesday.
Carrey, 43, the star of last year's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Truman Show (1998) and The Mask (1994) will play Robert Ripley in the Paramount Pictures movie scheduled for release in 2007, Daily Variety said.
The teaming of Carrey and Edward Scisssorhands director Burton comes after the success of their 2005 collaboration, a remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
"It is a great fit for both Jim and Tim, because it is a visual action-adventure setting, but a character with emotion, humanity and comedic sensibilities, all qualities Jim is best at," Paramount's Brad Weston said.
Ripley was an American explorer, anthropologist and newspaper cartoonist who created the Ripley's Believe It or Not series of bizarre but true facts from across the planet.
His extraordinary career ended when he died in China in 1949 at the age of 58.
The film, which is set to begin production in London next October, will begin tracking Ripley at a time when he has won celebrity status but learns to appreciate his unusual human discoveries as more than mere conquests to be catalogued, Variety said.
- AFP