Thursday, October 8

• RZA joins Downey Jr. and Galifianakis in Due Date

  Variety reports that Wu-Tang Clan rapper RZA will star with Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis in Due Date, the upcoming comedy from director Todd Phillips (The Hangover, Old School, Starsky & Hutch).

  The story involves a soon-to-be father who is in danger of missing his child's birth. In order to make it on time, he has to enlist the help of an underachieving college student, who takes him on a road trip.

  The RZA has already starred in and produced music for a number of features, perhaps most notably those of indie filmmaker Jim Jarmusch. If you haven't yet seen it, check out this hilarious clip from Jarmusch's Coffee and Cigarettes, in which RZA discusses the ills of caffeine addiction with fellow Wu-Tang member GZA and ... Bill Murray.

  RZA is also starring in Paul Haggis's upcoming movie The Next Three Days and is scoring Robbie Brenner's Warriors Way.

  Due Date also stars Michelle Monaghan and Jamie Foxx and is scheduled for a November 5, 2010 release.

  
  

  Posted 10/08/2009 by Rich Z

  Related: Jamie Foxx | Michelle Monaghan | Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Robert Downey Jr. | RZA | Due Date

Friday, September 18

• Michelle Monaghan Due to Join Hangover Team and Robert Downey Jr.

  Todd Phillips took a chance when he forced Warner Bros. to let him cast Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, and Zach Galifianakis in The Hangover, but his gamble paid off when Hangover became the highest grossing R-rated comedy ever in July. Up next for Phillips is Due Date, a road trip comedy about an expectant father (Robert Downey Jr.) trying to race home to see the birth of his child alongside an annoying travel partner (Galifianakis).

  Variety reports that Michelle Monaghan is set to join the comedy as Downey Jr.'s pregnant wife, reuniting her with her Kiss Kiss Bang Bang co-star. Shooting begins this fall.

  
  
  Next Showing: Due Date is scheduled to open November 5, 2010

  Posted 09/18/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Michelle Monaghan | Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Robert Downey Jr. | Due Date | The Hangover

Thursday, August 13

• Hangover Star Ed Helms Gets Intelligence

  When a movie becomes the most successful R-rated comedy ever like The Hangover has, it's a given that its stars are going to suddenly explode into more movies. With a Hangover sequel already in the works, the movie's trio of stars have also lined up other projects. Zach Galifianakis is working with Hangover director Todd Phillips on Due Date, Bradley Cooper will be seen next in All About Steve a comedy with Sandra Bullock that opens September 4, and Ed Helms has lined up the comedy Central Intelligence, where an accountant is thrown into the world of espionage after re-connecting with an old friend on Facebook. The script is written by MadTV's Ike Barinholtz and Dave Stassen.

  Helms will also star in Cedar Rapids, a comedy from producer Alexander Payne (Sideways) and director Miguel Arteta, where Helms will play an insurance salesman who travels cross country to attend a convention in an attempt to save the jobs of his co-workers. Rapids starts production this October.

  There's no word if Helms will shoot Intelligence before work begins on Hangover 2 in the fall of 2010. He can be seen next in The Goods: Sell Hard, Live Hard, which opens August 14.

  
  

  Posted 08/13/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Alexander Payne | Bradley Cooper | Miguel Arteta | Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Ed Helms | Ike Barinholtz | The Hangover | The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard

Sunday, July 26

• Robert Downey Jr. to Star in Comedy from The Hangover Director

  

  Variety reports that Robert Downey Jr. has struck a deal with Warner Bros. and will star in Due Date with Zach Galifianakis. The comedy, which begins shooting this fall and is scheduled for release sometime in 2010, will see Downey as an expectant father who goes on a road trip in order to make it to the birth of his first-born child.

  The movie will be directed by Todd Phillips (Old School, Road Trip) from a script by Alan R. Cohen and Alan Freedland (with revisions by Adam Sztykiel). Phillips' most recent movie, The Hangover, recently became the highest-grossing R-rated comedy ever.

  
  

  Posted 07/26/2009 by Rich Z

  Related: Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Robert Downey Jr. | The Hangover

Monday, July 13

• The Hangover Sequel Has Release Date Set

  Considering the success of The Hangover, a sequel seems like a foregone conclusion. However, it's one that Warner Bros. decided to make two months before the hit comedy even opened. While no details regarding the story for The Hangover 2 have been given, the movie is set to open Memorial Day weekend in 2011.

  Director Todd Phillips credits the success of the movie to stars Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, and Ed Helms, all of whom Warner Bros. was nervous to cast.

  I remember some executives just didn't understand the casting, and on The Hangover, I felt we'd been seeing the same faces in a lot of comedies, and that it was time to mix it up. Warners was a bit apprehensive...

  With The Hangover poised to be the top-grossing R-rated movie for Warners this year, Phillips was certainly right. Now he just has to figure out what to do in the sequel before it goes into production October 2010.

  
  

  Posted 07/13/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Bradley Cooper | Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Ed Helms | The Hangover

Monday, June 1

• New Official The Hangover Trailer Now Online

  The newest trailer for The Hangover, the bachelor party comedy from Old School director Todd Phillips, gives a little insight into the lives of the groomsmen and the bachelor before they reached Vegas:

  
  
  Next Showing: The Hangover opens June 5

  Posted 06/01/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Todd Phillips | The Hangover | Old School

Tuesday, May 26

• The Hangover Early Reviews

  Todd Phillips directed the "movie dude" classic Old School in 2003, then followed it up with Starsky and Hutch and School for Scoundrels. If early reviews are any indication, Phillips has regained some of that Old School magic with The Hangover, which has buzz as the sleeper comedy hit of the summer.

  "...a piercingly funny, twisted 'whatever-happens-in-Vegas' caper that can't be faulted for not taking full advantage of its R rating."

  -- Michael Rechtshaffen, Hollywood Reporter

  "At once raucously free-wheeling and meticulously contrived, pic satisfies as a boys-gone-wild laff riot that also clicks as a seriocomic beat-the-clock detective story."

  -- Joe Leydon, Variety

  
  
  

  Reelz Clip

  From the Director of Old School - Releasing June 5, 2009

  Posted 05/26/2009 by reelz

  Related: Todd Phillips | The Hangover

Friday, May 8

• You Can Feel the New Hangover Trailer in the Air Tonight

  The upcoming bachelor party comedy The Hangover, starring possible Green Lantern Bradley Cooper along with Zach Galifianakis and Ed Helms, has a new, unrated trailer. Directed by Old School director Todd Phillips, this may be the out-of-control Vegas bachelor party movie to end to end all out-of-control Vegas bachelor party movies. It also sets the bar for all other summer comedies: Can you beat Mike Tyson feeling some Phil Collins? You'd better try.

  
  

  Posted 05/08/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Bradley Cooper | Todd Phillips | Zach Galifianakis | Mike Tyson | Ed Helms | Green Lantern | Old School | The Hangover

Wednesday, November 5

• On the Set of The Hangover

  One of the more-intriguing releases on the 2009 movie calendar is The Hangover, a new comedy from Old School director Todd Phillips. After hitting the jackpot in 2003 with the help of newly minted "frat pack" members Will Ferrell, Vince Vaughn, and Luke Wilson, Phillips faltered with his next two releases, Starsky & Hutch and School for Scoundrels, before reportedly being booted from the Borat director's chair due to alleged "creative differences" with star Sacha Baron Cohen.

  It seems appropriate, then, that Phillips chose to return to familiar territory for The Hangover, a raucous, irreverent comedy about three guys who throw an epic bachelor party for their buddy -- only to awaken the next day to find that the groom-to-be has vanished.

  ReelzChannel.com recently stopped by The Hangover's set at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas, where we spoke with Phillips and stars Ed Helms, Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, and Justin Bartha. Do they have a shot at restoring Phillips' Old School comedy mojo? Bartha, who together with Nicolas Cage's wig provided much of the comic relief in both National Treasure flicks, thinks so. He went so far as to guarantee that The Hangover would be the funniest movie of 2009. Funnier than Underworld: Rise of the Lycans? Good luck.

  Check back soon for an in-depth preview of The Hangover, which opens nationwide on June 5, 2009.

  
  

  Posted 11/05/2008 by reelz

  Related: Todd Phillips | Ed Helms

Tuesday, June 19

• Black Magic

  Jack Black (High Fidelity, The School of Rock) and Todd Phillips(Old School, Road Trip) are teaming up to bring you the funny in Man-Witch, a Warner Bros. comedy in which Black will star as a schoolteacher with the magic touch.

  In it, Black agrees to attend a school for witches, only to discover it is an all-girls' school. One can only imagine the naughty mayhem that ensues.

  Man-Witch's pedigree poises it to be the perfect comedy storm. Not only does it have Phillips directing and Black starring, Man-Witch is being written by Jay Reiss (currently starring the Broadway version of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee) and produced by Neal Moritz (Evan Almighty, Saving Silverman) and Scott Budnick (School for Scoundrels, Starsky and Hutch). Also producing is Ori Marmur (The Jacket, Into the Blue).

  Perhaps a better title would be The Annual Old School of Rock for Almighty Scoundrels.

  
  

  Posted 06/19/2007 by reelz

  Related: Jack Black | Todd Phillips | Neal Moritz | Man-Witch