Clooney joins Soderbergh team
Duo running with 'Leatherheads' for U
Soderbergh will helm from a script he developed five years ago with writers Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly.
Producers are Sydney Pollack through his Mirage Enterprises and Robert Newmyer through Outlaw Prods.
U is hoping to get the project into production by March. Clooney will finish up "Three Kings" for Warner Bros. and continue on television's "ER." Soderbergh is in pre-production on "The Limey" for Artisan Entertainment.
Clooney had been loosely attached to "Leatherheads" (Daily Variety, July 10), but committed after Soderbergh signed on a second time. The director had been on the pic with Brantley and Reilly scripting in the early 1990s, but left over casting conflicts.
Universal resurrected the project with Jonathan Mostow directing and Jon Favreau scripting. But they drafted a more serious rendition of the project as a potential epic in the "Braveheart" vein.
When Clooney came on board, he read the Soderbergh version after the pair had made "Out of Sight," and decided he preferred the comedy.
Pic takes place during the early years of professional football in the 1920s. Story follows an aging footballer (Clooney) who convinces a young college star to dump his school and play in the pros.
"Bottom line is that if George and I had not had such a good experience on 'Out of Sight,' and if Universal hadn't been happy with the rest, none of this would have happened," Soderbergh said.
Clooney compared Soderbergh's approach to the style of a Howard Hawks pic. "It's got a great romance between the guy and the girl against this beginning-of-football backdrop," Clooney said.
"Steven has a dry sense of humor. He's evil is what he is. As often as you can do a movie with guys like that, do it," he added.
Clooney's feature credits include "Batman and Robin," "Peacemaker" and a cameo in the upcoming "The Thin Red Line."
Soderbergh won the Cannes Film Festival's top prize in 1989 with "sex, lies and videotape." His other films include "King of the Hill" "Kafka," "Schizopolis" and "Gray's Anatomy."
