Todd Phillips producing a Russian Brides drama

That Todd Phillips! If he’s not sending Will Ferrell streaking through the streets in Old School, he’s forcing Jon Heder to take self-assertion lessons from Billy Bob Thornton in the upcoming School For Scoundrels. He’s all about the funny.

Which is why we’re surprised to see him switch tracks and produce a drama about Russian brides. He won’t be directing the untitled film – which has been pulled from the mud of Miramax turnaround hell by Warner Bros. But perhaps we shouldn’t be that shocked – he did, after all, produce Steven Zaillian’s All The King’s Men, which features zero examples of Ben Stiller in a silly wig.

The movie will be based on writer David Benioff’s Arena magazine article Goodbye To Romance, which follows a group of American men travelling through Russia on the hunt for possible wives. E Max Frye wrote an early draft of the screenplay, but Phillips will be bringing in another writer to take another swipe at it. If Philips likes the final version, he may sit in the director’s chair to bring it to the screen.