Jeff Bridges in talks for 'True Grit'

Role would reunite 'Lebowski' star with Coens

By MICHAEL FLEMING

In what is shaping up as a "Big Lebowski" reunion, Jeff Bridges is in discussions with Paramount to star in Joel and Ethan Coen's redo of "True Grit." Bridges would play the role that won John Wayne an Oscar for the 1969 original.

Bridges last worked with the Coens when he turned in a heralded performance as Jeffrey "the Dude" Lebowski in the 1998 cult fave.

The picture, which also reunites the Coens with their "No Country for Old Men" producing partner Scott Rudin, has been redrafted by the brothers to be more faithful to the Charles Portis novel on which the original film was based.

Story centers on a 14-year-old girl who tags along with an aging U.S. marshal, Rooster Cogburn, and another lawman to track the outlaw who killed her father. The original told the story from Cogburn's point of view, but the new version will work from the viewpoint of the girl.

The Coens premiere "A Serious Man" at the Toronto Film Festival. Bridges most recently starred in "The Men Who Stare at Goats" and reprised in "Tron Legacy."

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