Reese Joining P.T. Anderson's Scientology Flick?

Reese Witherspoon followed up her Oscar with a series of very questionable choices, everything from Rendition to Four Christmases. It looks like she's finally starting to take the acting part of the job more seriously, though, signing on for Francis Lawrence's Water for Elephants and possibly appearing in Gary Ross' long-gestating Tokyo Suckerpunch. Now comes news from Production Weekly (via The Wrap) that Witherspoon may take a smaller role than we're used to seeing her in, albeit a very important one in Paul Thomas Anderson's untitled drama that may pull a Citizen Kane on Scientology. Like Kane, Anderson's movie appears to be very close on key points to Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, right down to Witherspoon's supposed character-in-waiting sharing a name with Hubbard's wife. Philip Seymour Hoffman would play the charismatic leader of a group called The Cause, that begins to grow in popularity in the early 1950s. Reese would play his much younger and pregnant wife, with Jeremy Renner on board to play Freddie, an alcoholic and drifter taken under the wing of "The Master," eventually becoming his right hand man before beginning to question the truth of the faith and The Master. Apparently, women don't play prominent roles in the script, and while I'm sure it would get beefed up a little bit for Witherspoon, she's d probably just welcome the chance to work with Anderson. Having Hoffman and Renner in the mix doesn't hurt, either. If this film is truly about Scientology, which seems fairly evident on the surface, I wonder what the blowback will be. Certainly the argument from the filmmakers could be that Christianity in general and the Catholic Church in particular has been a frequent source of interesting story lines, whether or not you agree with them. However, the Church of Scientology really really really really doesn't like criticism. Really doesn't like it, so I would expect you'll hear something from them when the time comes.

Comments

[D]

I guess Les Grossman won't be producing.

[Get The Big Picture]

Ha!

[andrew]

hopefulyl they will pull a south park on that BS haha

[SEAN]

I'm wonderiing if producers/ studio heads/ head honcho's would stop this film from coming out....I mean last time I check quite a bit of Hollywood are infact Scientologists.

I hope it pulls through, I love seeing Phil Hoffman in any kind of drama its a treat