'Collateral' gets its girl

Pinkett Smith to star with Cruise, Foxx for Mann

By MARC GRASER, DANA HARRIS

Jada Pinkett Smith has signed on as the femme lead in DreamWorks' and Paramount Pictures' thriller "Collateral."

She will star opposite Tom Cruise, Jamie Foxx and Val Kilmer in the pic, in which a cab driver becomes the hostage of a contract killer as he commits a series of murders. Pinkett Smith will play Annie, the love interest to Foxx's cab-driving character.

Also cast, as the mother of the cabbie, is Irma P. Hall, whose credits include "Soul Food" and "Bad Company."

Michael Mann directs "Collateral" from a script written by Stuart Beattie and Frank Darabont.

The film, planned for an October 2004 release, is expected to begin lensing around Los Angeles next month. DreamWorks handles domestic distribution, Par international through UIP.

Pinkett Smith was seen most recently in Warner Bros.' "The Matrix Reloaded" and will return in "The Matrix Revolutions." She is set to provide a voice in DreamWorks' toon "Madagascar."

Hall next will be seen in the Coen brothers' remake of "The Ladykillers," which is in production for Disney.