The Casting Couch: April 28, 2006

Paramount Classics is in negotiations with helmer Larry Charles to direct The Dirt, a Motley Crue biopic based on the rockers’ 2001 book “The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band.”

Project has been set up at MTV Films with XXX scribe Rich Wilkes adapting the book for the screen.

The book was penned by Motley Crue themselves — bandmates Nikki Sixx, Tommy Lee, Mick Mars and Vince Neil with writer Neil Strauss — and tells the story of the band’s rise, complete with all the ups and downs in friendships, on tour and in the studio. Sixx, Lee, Mars, Neil and Strauss will receive exec producer credits.

SOURCE: Variety

Walt Disney Pictures has hired Kathryn Price and Nichole Millard to write I’d Tell You, but Then I’d Have to Kill You, an adaptation of a young-adult novel by Ally Carter.

The book centers on a 15-year-old girl who attends an elite spy-training academy in Washington and must deal with the mystery surrounding the death of her CIA agent father, her “Alias”-style spy education and a cute, off-limits civilian boy who doesn’t know her true identity.

SOURCE: The Hollywood Reporter

Jennifer Ehle has signed on to replace Samantha Morton and star opposite Edward Norton and Colin Farrell in New Line Cinema’s crime drama Pride and Glory. Ehle will play Abby Tierney in the story that revolves around a three-generation family of New York cops. The family is thrown into turmoil when one son (Norton) uncovers a police corruption scandal involving his brother.

SOURCE: The Hollywood Reporter

Amber Heard is starring in The Beautiful Ordinary, a teen comedy-drama being directed by newcomer Jessica Manafort. The story revolves around the relationship dynamics of a group of suburban teens on the last day of school in 1999. Heard will play a cool “stoner” chick who is looking for direction and meaning in her life. A shoot beginning next week in Wilmington, N.C., is being planned.

SOURCE: The Hollywood Reporter