ROTTEN IDEAS OF THE WEEK from Rotten Tomatoes

ROTTEN IDEAS OF THE WEEK from Rotten Tomatoes

ROBERT DOWNEY JR IS OUT AS OZ, BUT IN AS MR. PEABODY?

One of the biggest casting stories of 2010 was the decision by Walt Disney Pictures to recruit Robert Downey Jr to star in Oz, the Great and Powerful, their prequel to The Wizard of Oz, which does for the Wizard what the Broadway musical Wicked did for the Wicked Witch of the West. This week, however, Downey dropped out of the project, which is the second time in the last few months that he has left a big-budget movie. George Clooney has now signed to replace Robert Downey Jr. in the science fiction movie Gravity, which also stars Sandra Bullock (who herself was cast after a long process that started with Angelina Jolie). Disney is now hoping to sign one of their favorite stars, Johnny Depp, to replace Robert Downey Jr, but Depp's own schedule is very busy (and he sort of just recently played a similar character in Disney's Alice in Wonderland). The week in RDJ news doesn't end there, however. DreamWorks Animation has announced plans to adapt one of the animated shorts, Peabody and Sherman, that was a regular feature on the Rocky & Bullwinkle Show back in the 1960s. Mr. Peabody was an incredibly smart talking dog, who along with "my boy Sherman," went on time travelling adventures to solve the great mysteries of history. DreamWorks has signed Robert Downey Jr. to provide the voice for Peabody in a fully CGI 3D movie that the company is scheduling for release in 2014. The directing job is going to Rob Minkoff, who was the codirector of The Lion King and Stuart Little before going solo with movies like Stuart Little 2, The Haunted Mansion and Forbidden Kingdom. Peabody and Sherman (not necessarily the final title) was adapted by the screenwriting team of Jeffrey Ventimilia and Joshua Sternin, who were producers and writers on That 70s Show, and have more recently cowritten Tooth Fairy, Surviving Christmas and Yogi Bear. This writer is actually a pretty big fan of the original Peabody and Sherman shorts (they were my favorite part of The Rocky & Bullwinkle Show), but this story lands in the Rotten Idea section for a few reasons. First, there is the fact that it comes along with Downey's departure from Sam Raimi's long awaited first movie after leaving the Spider-Man franchise last year. Finally, the credits of both the screenwriters and the director include several movies with either low or mixed average scores on the Tomatometer.