While I've been catching up with the many stories of writer James Thurber every Friday on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, the one that has eluded me is probably his most well known: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
. The story is of a boring, nondescript man named Walter Mitty who leads a life where he's basically at the whim of others, to the point of being bullied. His only escape comes from the many daydreams that occupy his mind, where he is ofcourse the hero of every story. This causes problems whenever he has to return to reality. A film version was released back in 1947 starring Danny Kaye, but a more modern one has been in the works for years with many people(Ron Howard, Gore Verbinski, Sacha Baron Cohen, Jim Carrey) taking a crack at it.Most recently Ben Stiller came aboard in the title role, and a director was being sought for the job. But now Twitch is reporting that Stiller has just decided to do both jobs himself, making this his first directorial gig since 2008's Tropic Thunder
. Steve Conrad(The Weather Man
, one of my faves) wrote the script, and I'll be curious to see where this goes with Stiller at the helm. Having not read Thurber's short(I intend to) I don't know the exact tone, but just going off the plot it certainly leaves the door open for Stiller to go too far down the comedy rabbit hole. One of my biggest problems with Tropic Thunder was Stiller's direction, especially when it came to his own character because it was like he couldn't rein himself in. I hope that doesn't happen here.
