Hey kids, did you know director Greg Mottola was the man behind the upcoming comedy Superbad, starring Jonah Hill and Michael Cera, and produced by Judd Apatow? Did you realise Mottola directed the whole thing, and that Apatow did not in fact poop it from his comedy funnel fully formed?
Okay, enough channelling of Mottola. But the massive launch of Superbad in the US does mean that Mottola is not short of job opportunities right now, ones that give him a chance to show he’s not just a cog in the comedy machine. Because he’s signed up to write an direct his own script, Adventureland for Miramax.
Roger Dodger’s Jesse Eisenberg will play an uptight college graduate who discovers he can’t quite afford the grand European tour he’d promised himself once he ditched academia. He ends up in a minimum wage summer McJob working at a local amusement park, but finds love, friends and just that little bit of maturity he needs to survive in the world.
"It's so rare to read a smart comedy like this one with great characters and emotional depth," gushed Miramax’s Keri Putnam, to Variety, presumably not adding, “which we intend to crush from it like a gorilla with a toilet paper tube.”
Mottola – who was the man behind the camera for Superbad, don’t forget – will start shooting in Pittsburgh this autumn. Okay Greg… we did what you said. Now let Knocked Up’s Seth Rogen out of the shark tank.
