Will we really get "The Greatest Muppet Movie Ever Made"? Here's hoping

If Jason Segel somehow manages to screw up his very-long-gestating Muppet movie, I'd be genuinely surprised, because as the pieces have - very slowly - come together, it all seems to be coming together perfectly so far.

The latest pieces to fit into the puzzle are the humans, apart from Segel, who long ago swiped the human lead in this for himself, and now he's surrounded himself with people I always like to watch. Amy Adams, Chris Cooper and Rashida Jones are all in negotiations to join the cast of what I believe is still titled "The Greatest Muppet Movie Ever Made."

In the movie, assuming it ever really happens, Adams would play Segel's character's girlfriend, Jones would play a TV executive, and best of all, Cooper would be the big bad, an oil man who - of course - wants to drill for black gold beneath the Muppets' studio.

And along with this casting news, it seems the story from Segel and co-writer Nicholas Stoller has changed in the many months since this was first announced. One of the benefits of making your movie at Disney, I suppose, is you probably constantly have really smart people giving you advice, and it seems that after table reads with Pixar folks like John Lasseter and others, the movie will now be loosely based on a Jim Henson idea originally titled "The Cheapest Muppet Movie Ever Made." In Henson's pitch, Gonzo is hired to direct a film, but ends up blowing his entire budget on the first day, and turns to his Muppet friends to bail him out and help him finish the flick.

Sounds like a classic Muppets premise to me, and though I have no actual idea when filming is set to begin on all this, to be directed by "Flight of the Conchords" vet James Bobin, it still has a release date set of Christmas Day 2011, so Muppet fans like me, keep hope alive!

Just a short report after that today with one more bit of good news, then it's off to a busier than usual Friday on which I have to care for some dogs and cats along with the regular daily grind.

Coming together much faster than "The Greatest Muppet Movie Ever Made" is "Sopranos" creator David Chase's as-yet-still-untitled first feature film.

He's found his three relative unknowns to star in the rock 'n' roll coming of age flick set (natch) in New Jersey: John Magaro, Jack Huston and Will Brill (mission accomplished, I suppose, because I've never heard of any of them.) Even better, he's now hired guitarman-turned-actor-turned-garage-band-promoting-DJ Steven Van Zandt, aka Silvio on "The Sopranos," to supervise the music for this and serve as executive producer.

The movie, set to begin shooting in January in New York, follows a group of suburban New Jersey guys making their way during the 1960s as a rock band called the Twilight Zones. Many of Chase's "Sopranos" behind-the-camera running mates have followed that up by working on HBO's sublimely entertaining Atlantic City crime epic "Boardwalk Empire," so here's hoping Chase now finds similar success on the big screen.

OK, all I have for the big finale is the first five minutes or so of the upcoming animated (in 3D if you choose, I have to assume) flick "Megamind," set to come out Nov. 5 with the voices of Will Ferrell, Brad Pitt, Tina Fey and Jonah Hill. Judging from this preview of sorts, the film should at least be very funny, and that's really usually all we can ask for from animated flicks nowadays. Enjoy the clip and have an at least excellent weekend. Peace out.

David Chase and the golden age of Hollywood

Wow. I knew NBC's "Kings" would be a hard show for folks to get into, but from the numbers it looks like only Al Swearengen's devoted fans even bothered to start with it in the first place. Though I didn't bother to tune in for these other two, it can't be a good sign that Sunday's two-hour debut had numbers (6 million viewers, 1.6 preliminary 18-49 rating) that get it the honor of being mentioned in the trades in the same sentence with "Chopping Block" and "Crusoe." Enjoy it while you can.

In much, much better - deliriously better, I'd go so far as to say - TV news, Henry Rollins will join the cast of "Sons of Anarchy" for six episodes when the FX show returns April 27. Though, not unlike "Kings," the tale of the SAMCRO motorcycle gang starring Ron Perlman, Katey Sagal and Charlie Hunnam of "Undeclared" fame (if there really is any of that) unfolds slowly, it's pretty friggin' engrossing if you let yourself go along for the ride.

Rollins, who puts both the bad and occasionally the ass too in badass, will play one of the club's new enemies in the California town of Charming. That should be nothing but cool, and besides, shouldn't the leader of Black Flag get the chance to add more to his acting resume so the trades won't keep pointing out he was in "Bad Boys 2"?

But, before I got off on that slight tangent, this was supposed to be about the return of David Chase to HBO, which can only be called a good thing, especially since it's NOT to do a "Sopranos" flick that picks up where the series rather ambiguously (and, in my book, flawlessly) left off.

Instead he's developing a miniseries called "A Ribbon of Dreams," which will begin in 1913 and follow two men, one a college-educated mechanical engineer and the other a cowboy with a violent past, who head out to Hollywood to get into the movie business. In the story, the two begin as employees of D.W. Griffith and then cross paths with the likes of John Ford, John Wayne, Raoul Walsh, Bette Davis and Billy Wilder as they become powers in the movie industry themselves.

The casting options for this alone are enough to keep my mind occupied and off of my daily workload for quite a while, but no other info (like when any of this might hit the airwaves) came out this morning.

Sounds plenty cool to me, but long before that HBO is also cooking up something with a lot lower profile that will hopefully turn into enough of a hit that I get to watch it soon for free online.

The last movie that Anthony Minghella managed to direct before he died (eerily enough) of a hemorrhage exactly one year ago tomorrow was one based on Alexander McCall Smith's "The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency," easily one of my favorite books. Minghella made it into a TV movie last year for HBO that just this morning got added to the "save" list on my Netflix queue for the day when it finally hits DVD, and come March 29 it will be reborn as a series for the channel. (And, it appears that if you're willing to watch it in installments on your computer, the entire movie is somehow on YouTube too in 11 parts or so.)

Starring R&B diva Jill Scott (who Tyler Perry has already proven is a pretty darn good actress), "The Wire" veteran Idris Elba and "Dreamgirl" Anika Noni Rose, the book, movie and now series are about Precious Ramotswe (Scott), who becomes the first female private detective in Botswana. It's light as air but all kinds of fun, so definitely tune in for this one if you can.

And, on a short tangential note before I close with the series trailer, was I the only who didn't know (until this morning) that Rashida Jones of "The Office" is Quincy Jones' daughter? I never would have guessed, but there's an interview with her this morning at Blackfilm.com to promote Friday's release of "I Love You, Man." Blackfilm.com, by the way, is a fantastic site and one that's a daily stop on my morning reading list, so definitely check it out.

But now here's the trailer for "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency," and with that I'm headed to the job I thankfully still have (though at least eight of my co-workers can't say that as of yesterday.) Enjoy, and have a perfectly pleasant Tuesday. Peace out.

"Sopranos": Who needs closure?

If you haven't seen the grand finale of "The Sopranos" yet, please skip this and move to the second segment of this post.

For those who did watch it, the last scene will certainly stir debate. I'll throw it down first: I flat out loved it.

Chase spent much of the episode like most TV finales do, wrapping up loose ends. Tony consolidates power once again with some of his best manuevering, visits Sil in his hospital bed and Uncle Junior in the state mental hospital, and tries unsuccessfully to get Paulie to take on a key new mission.

OK, so far, so good. At the end of a traditional finale, of course, we'd then want to know what happens to Tony. But instead David Chase threw a curveball with a final scene that brilliantly leaves us guessing.

I watched the last five minutes or so again this morning, and it's just perfectly constructed. Every sound and camera move adds to the tension, undercut by Journey playing in the background and Meadow's comical inability to parallel park her car (a skill which I've never felt the need to master.) And then, of course, it fades to black.

Were we cheated? I say hell no. Chase's point, if I may be so bold to guess, has always been that, no matter how hard he schemes to hold on to power, Tony will never live in a world full of certainty. He'll always be in danger, and that's the way we (or at least I) like to see him.

I know there are many people out there who would have liked to see the scene end with more closure, but this mini-season, especially in the penultimate episode and this brilliant lack-of-finale, was just pitch-perfect to me.

HBO's third best show ever (behind only "The Larry Sanders Show" and "The Wire") has gone out on top. Agree? Disagree? Please let me know what you think.

Van Sant to drink the Kool-Aid

Gus Van Sant is a director who frequently just makes my blood boil. Capable of greatness ("Drugstore Cowboy" and "Elephant"), he just as often turns out treacle ("Finding Forrester") or, because he has no original thoughts of his own, just copies a great movie, shot-for-shot ("Psycho").

Now, however, he's got his hands on something that just might inspire him to greatness again. He's set to direct a big-screen version of Tom Wolfe's (not Ken Kesey's, as frequent visitor Bill was kind enough to politely point out) "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test," with "Big Love" scribe Lance Black writing the script.

It's been a long time since I read the book, but if I remember correctly it's about Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters driving cross-country to the 1964 World's Fair in New York, spreading LSD and good cheer along the way.

Sounds tailor-made to Van Sant's strengths, and he's clearly loved Kesey for a long time, casting him in his truly odd take on "Even Cowgirls Get the Blues." Van Sant's current project, "Paranoid Park," based on Blake Nelson's novel about a skaterat who is involved in the accidental death of a security guard, got good notices this year at Cannes, and will get at least some kind of U.S. release this fall.

Time-waster of the day

Premiere magazine, which I believe now only exists in digital form, has performed a generous public service for those of us who would rather read about movies than do our actual jobs.

They've compiled a list of the 20 films they'd most see like to get out of development hell and on to the big screen. You can find out the status of not only classic failures like Terry Gilliam's "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote" but also movies based on two of my favorite books, "The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay" and "Confederacy of Dunces."

It's incredibly addictive reading, so don't start unless you've got 20 minutes or so to spare. Click here to enjoy, and have an entirely bearable Monday.