Reese wants Payne

Yesterday, veteran movie critic Jeff Wells posted a story about an upcoming film from SIDEWAYS director Alexander Payne titled DOWNSIZING that had Sacha Baron Cohen, Paul Giamatti, Meryl Streep and Reese Witherspoon committed to the project but not actually signed on to star. Variety recently chimed in with their “official” word on the matter and it seems Payne is currently writing a script for DOWNSIZING with everyone except Streep mentioned as “committed” to the film. The story would star Giamatti as a man who decides the best way to ease his problems is to shrink himself. Witherspoon would play a woman he meets along the way with Cohen playing a wacky tiny-sized foreigner. Payne has a first look deal at Fox Searchlight so this is likely where he’s gonna set up the project but the shrinking special effects might make it outside Searchlight’s budget and also outside Payne’s quirky drama territory. Which makes this a very cool project to keep an eye on.