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Warner Bros Lines Up Steve Carell in 'A Boyfriend for My Wife'

by Ethan Anderton
August 26, 2010

Once production on the seventh season of NBC's series "The Office" concludes, Steve Carell is going to be one busy man. Recently he was announced for a role in The Abstinence Teacher with Sandra Bullock and the DreamWorks comedy Raised by Wolfs and now he has another project on his slate. Variety reports Warner Bros. is developing A Boyfriend for My Wife, a remake of a 2008 romantic comedy from Argentina, and Carell is lined-up to lead the film. The story follows a timid husband who believes the only way of escaping marriage is to get his wife to fall in love with another man, so he enlists the help of a legendary Cassanova.

Sadly, writers Mark Gibson and Phil Halprin (Snow Dogs, The In Crowd) don't inspire much hope for this. Apparently the original film, directed by Juan Taratuto was one of the biggest movies in Argentina back in 2008. I'm anxious to see Carell take on more film roles once he concludes his seven year run on "The Office" but hopefully he steps up his game in comedy. He's been relatively funny in films like Get Smart and Dinner for Schmucks, but I'd like to see a little less slapstick and a little more wit. As for drama, something along the lines of Dan in Real Life (but without an insufferable Dane Cook) would be nice. What do you think?

Explore tags: Casting, Movie News, Opinions

http://iconocritic.com peloquin

I like Carell, but I agree he should take some more dramatic roles rather than the comedic ones. I surprisingly enjoyed Date Night though so he's still got some of his slapstick spark.
Alfredo

Doesn't this sound like the side-story in Extract? Like the above poster, I like Steve Carell, but he needs to start picking better roles, or he'll end up being hated on like Will Ferrell eventually was.
Mark

I love Steve Carell's slapstick, but unfortunately whenever he's doing it in a film, his co-stars ruin it by being aware of the slapstick. Slapstick only really works when it's played straight. He and Tina Fey were great in Date Night, but everything around them was so silly, it brought the movie down. It was a movie that was too aware that it was supposed to be a comedy, and because of that ended up not being funny.