Alexander Paynehas built his career on being a kind of poet of the road or, perhaps more accurately, an old wise friend of the American highways. He sees the romanticism of this sort of travel but doesn’t ignore the painful roots that these trips are meant to excise or, in some cases, worsen. In his last movie, the lovingly detailedNebraska, the road to the titular state seems to be a kind of desperate journey to redemption or reclamation forBruce Dern’s Woody Grant and his son, David (Will Forte).About Schmidtoffered a similar kind of taking-in of one’s age via the road withJack Nicholson’s Warren Schmidt, one of the actor’s last great performances (alongsideThe Departed).
So, it’s not so surprising to hear (via Thompson on Hollywood) that Payne is now looking to return to the road withMy Saga, an adaptation of a pair of articles byKarl Ove Knausgaardthat appeared in New York Magazine. The Norwegian journalist, who recently attained a cult status after writing a six-volume autobiography called “My Struggle,” traveled America by following the path taken by Vikings way back in the day, and its this very trip that Payne will be bringing to the big screen. Payne is attached, but the film is still currently seeking a writer to adapt the two articles into a feature-length script.
This gives Payne plenty of time to shootDownsizing, a comedy that has been on his to-do list for years now, which will pair him once again withReese Witherspoonfor the first time since his fantastic breakout film,Election. The film is set to be released in 2017, and also starsJason Sudeikis,Matt Damon,Neil Patrick Harris, andAlec Baldwin, making it Payne’s biggest cast thus far in his career. Production onDownsizingis set to begin soon, which would suggest thatMy Sagawill begin shooting in 2017 while presumable marketing begins onDownsizing, assuming that this project doesn’t get stuck in the so-called development hell the way his next project did. We shall see.
