With An Eye Towards The Future

Michael Fleming of Variety has some recent casting news for The Mummy 3:

Universal Pictures and director Rob Cohen have set Luke Ford [pictured] to star in the third installment of "The Mummy," in a move that potentially sets the franchise up for future films.

The 26-year-old Australian actor was cast with the expectation that he will eventually carry the franchise.

"We may spin off into a complete father-son direction with Brendan (Fraser, who played the adventurer who battled the monster in the first two installments), but by getting an actor who is in his 20s and not a teenager, we can also put the future on his shoulders," Cohen told Daily Variety. "He tested against four much more established actors, and he was magic when he read with Brendan.".

In "The Mummy" sequel, Ford will play Alex O'Connell, the 20ish son of adventurer Rick O'Connell (Fraser), who journeys into the forbidden tombs of China and into the Himalayas, where they run into a new shape-shifting mummy, a former Chinese emperor who was cursed by a female wizard.

Jet Li plays the mummy, Michelle Yeoh the wizard. The studio has tested six actresses to replace Rachel Weisz in the role of Evelyn Carnahan O'Connell after she declined to reprise.

Shooting will begin in Montreal on July 27, and then move to China. Pic will open in July 2008, just before the Olympics begin in Beijing.

Ford just finished starring with Toni Collette in the Elissa Down-directed "The Black Balloon," and has appeared in "Kokoda" and [the telefilm] "Junction Boys".

I haven't seen any of Ford's work, therefore, it's difficult to get excited either way on this news. But if the suits have hope that Ford will carry the series--He'd better be more than good...

I find it much more interesting that six actresses have tested for the Weisz role...

The "let's bring in new blood" to an existing franchise--with the hopes of continuing the cash cow--without having to write big star paychecks, is the "in" thing for Hollywood, right now.

-Shia LaBeouf may be playing the son of Indiana Jones in the fourth installment of that franchise, (although no one is being specific on that point--I think it's a safe bet).

--Fox recently just announced that David Goyer is set to develop the Sheldon Turner-scripted Magneto film, an X-Men spin-off, that focuses on a young Magneto and Professor Xavier.