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The flick, which will be directed by a French filmmaker
with a laughingly pretentious single name: "Pitof".
(Please write your own jokes with the word OFF.)
This could be perfect casting as Berry's reputation in the biz, is less than purrfect. We all know Berry likes working out in leather outfits, having watched her battle baddies as butt-kicking Bond babe Jinx (a role that proved so popular with producers that she's in talks to spin off the role into her own movie franchise) and as the white-haired weather-channeling mutant Storm in the two X-Men flicks.
While Catwoman will allow her to tap into her inner cattiness, maybe she'll get better one-liners than the duds she had in X-Men ('Do you know what happens to a toad when it's struck by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else').
To that end, the studio says it's satisfied with a rewrite of John Rogers' original screenplay, tweaked by scribes Mike Ferris and John Brancato, enough to give the go-ahead to start production. Shooting on Catwoman is slated for later this year.
The flick, which will be helmed by French filmmaker Pitof (best known Stateside for doing the visual effects for 1997's Alien: Resurrection), will find the felonious feline transitioning from supporting villain to star in what's being billed as a dark, stylistic noir à la the first two installments of gloommeister Tim Burton (news)'s Batman franchise.
Of course, Burton introduced Michelle Pfeiffer (news) as the Caped Crusader's purr-fect foil in the second installment, Batman Returns. Pfeiffer slunk sexily around rooftops in that tight-fitting dominatrix getup and alternately turned on and tortured our hero with her trusty whip.
Following that film, Pfeiffer and Burton had hoped to give Catwoman her own pedigree franchise, but the project took a catnap until two years ago, when Warners resurrected it with Ashley Judd (news) in the role. But by the time the writers finally hashed out a workable script, Judd was forced to bail because--ironically enough--she had already agreed to sink her claws into the role of Maggie the Cat in a Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, which would've conflicted with Catwoman's filming.
Berry's name surfaced in about two weeks, Variety says, and studio execs sat down with her handlers on Thursday. The studio hopes to get a deal done fast. Before she gets her puss on, however, Berry must shoot Warners' Gothika with Robert Downey (news) Jr. and Penélope Cruz. Cameras roll on that project in the coming weeks.
She'll next be seen in X2, due out May 2 from 20th Century Fox.
Berry, who became the first African American to win
a Best Actress Oscar last year for her emotionally
unsettling performance in the interracial drama Monster's
Ball, would become the second black woman to take
on Catwoman, following in the paw prints of Eartha
Kitt (news), who was one of three actresses to play
the part on the 1960s Batman TV series.
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