You won't be blamed for forgetting that Robert Downey Jr. attached himself to produce and star in a big screen take on Perry Mason. The actor has never had so much currently in development, and since we'd heard practically nothing on the film since last October, it possibly could've been just another project that we'll never see come to pass. However, it looks like progress is being made, as a writer has finally been hired to bring the lawyer's adventures to life.
THR reports that Marc Guggenheim has been hired to pen the script, which will retain the 1930s setting established by creator Erle Stanley Gardner. The character, who was basically a lawyer/detective who specialized in getting his usually innocent clients off the hook for murder, has been featured in over 80 novels selling well over 135M copies. After starting off in a series of radio programs, the character jumped into film, portrayed mostly by Warren William. However he's still best remembered for the long running TV series starring Raymond Burr.
I'm continually surprised that studios insist on hiring Guggenheim for...well, anything. As if the Green Lantern debacle last year wasn't bad enough, he also wrote the terrible script for X-men Origins: Wolverine. Beyond that, he was never a very good comic book scribe, either. He had a decent run on Wolverine but beyond that has been a writer who has managed to stay busy because of his connections, rather than any actual success.
