CBS Films didn’t get off to a promising start with the dismal Extraordinary Measures. It looks like they have ambitious plans though. LA Times reports that a few high profile actors are in talks to play the lead Marshal Matt Dillon for a film adaptation of Gunsmoke, the famous Western TV show. Brad Pitt and Ryan Reynolds are high in the running for the part. Check out a snippet of their report below.
As incarnated first on the mid-century radio serial and later in the CBS prime-time hit, Dillon is the Western hero charged with maintaining law and order in a period Kansas town filled with colorful vagrants, misfits and desperadoes. He carries on in these adventures with the help of town physician Doc Adams and tavern owner Miss Kitty Russell.
Pitt is a frontrunner after his incredible performance in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, one of our Top 10 Films of the Decade. After becoming a name to reckon with, cast as the lead in The Green Lantern, Ryan Reynolds is also quite high on the list. CBS Films “wants to contemporize the look and feel of Gunsmoke while maintaining the period American West setting, though some observers have asked whether modern theatrical audiences will have an appetite for Westerns.”
No director has been attached yet, but Gregory Poirier (National Treasure: Book of Secrets, The Spy Next Door) has written a draft, which the studio has taken a liking to. I would love to see Brad Pitt in the role, but I don’t have faith in CBS films after Measures and their Jennifer Lopez romantic comedy, The Back Up Plan, doesn’t look too promising.
What do you think about the project? Who would you like cast?