* The awesome Brie Larson(21 Jump Street) has won the lead role in Short Term 12, Destin Cretton's indie drama based on his Sundance award-winning short film. Larson will play a woman with a difficult past who works as a counselor to troubled youths in a foster home. The story centers on her struggle to feel worthy of helping anyone else. It's unclear when this would shoot, as she's got Peter Bogdanovich's Squirrel to the Nuts next on her schedule. She recently wrapped Joseph Gordon-Levitt's directorial debut, Don Jon's Addiction, and The Spectacular Now for James Ponsoldt.[Deadline]
* Well, now that he's been freed from the weight of HBO's Boardwalk Empire, Michael Pitt is jumping back to the big screen for what could be his first film since 2008's Funny Games. He'll play Owen Moore, the husband of screen legend Mary Pickford in the biopic, The First. American Horror Story's Lily Rabe will play Pickford, and the film will be introduced in Toronto next month, fitting for the Toronto-born actress, one of the original founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Jennifer DeLia will direct, based on a script adapted from Eileen Whitfield's biography, Pickford: The Woman Who Made Hollywood. [Deadline]
* I don't know what in the frig a Hart of Dixie is, but Claudia Lee is apparently in it and has just signed on for a co-starring role in Kick-Ass 2: Balls to the Wall. Her role is unknown at this point, which means she probably won't be playing one of the vigilante heroes in the group known as Justice Forever. Lee joins Aaron Johnson, Chloe Moretz, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Lindy Booth, Morris Chestnut, John Leguizamo, Donald Faison, Andy Nyman, Yancy Butler, and Robert Emms. Jeff Wadlow takes over as director with Matthew Vaughn producing and writing the screenplay. [Deadline]
