Melissa McCarthy has for years been riding a wave of popularity, from a major supporting role on Gilmore Girls to her current box office hit Identity Thief. And with accolades like an Emmy for Mike & Molly and an Academy Award nomination for her role in Bridesmaids, not to mention all of the other awards she won, her career may soon hit the intersecting apexes of talent and cool points.
McCarthy will soon be asked to play the female lead opposite a cantankerous Bill Murray in The Weinstein Company’s St. Vincent De Van Nuys, Deadline reports. The role is a highly sought-after one among actresses, as it comes from the Black List script written by Ted Melfi and has drawn comparisons to both As Good As It Gets and Silver Linings Playbook for its deft ability to inject genuinely human situations with organic comedy. McCarthy auditioned hard for the job, and her past work will be more than enough to get her hired.
Melfi will also direct the project, which gained a lot of ground when Murray agreed to play the titular role, admitting to Melfi that the character is Bill Murray himself at times. Who could possibly picture Murray as a corrupt, thieving, lying gambler? McCarthy will play his new neighbor, a single mother whose multi-shift hospital schedule forces her hand in asking De Van Nuys to look after her good-hearted 12-year-old son. Though the elder gentleman subjects the boy to much of his bad behavior, only the positive aspects are filtered through. It’s hard to see where this project could go wrong, especially if Melfi’s script is as affecting as its buzz has implied.
Before that, though, McCarthy will be promoting her reteaming with Bridesmaids director Paul Feig for the action comedy The Heat, which she stars in opposite Sandra Bullock, as well as her role in The Hangover Part III. She’ll soon begin filming Tammy, which she co-wrote and will co-direct with her husband Ben Falcone, where she’ll go on a road trip with a drunken Shirley MacLaine. St. Vincent De Van Nuys should begin filming in July.
