The past week has seen a flurry of casting announcements for the Seth Gordon-directed comedy “Horrible Bosses,” with Jason Bateman, Charlie Day (“It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia”), Jennifer Aniston, Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx also coming on board. Now we’ve noticed one more actor who’s joined the impressive cast; “Saturday Night Live” star Jason Sudeikis.
The latest issue of Production Weekly (again, not online, although accessible for subscribers) features the actor’s name amongst the above names. It’s unknown what role the actor will play, but the plot involves three friends (Bateman, Day and one other) who enlist the help of a scam artist, the creatively-named Motherfucker Jones (Foxx) to plan the deaths of their titular employers (Aniston, Farrell and one other), so we imagine Sudeikis is either playing a boss, or, more likely considering his everyman appeal, one of the plotters.
Sudeikis has been a cast member on SNL for six seasons now, but his movie roles have mostly been restricted to cameos in the ignominious likes of “The Rocker,” “What Happens In Vegas” and the upcoming “Dinner for Schmucks.” However, the actor has bigger supporting roles coming up in the Drew Barrymore/Justin Long rom-com “Going the Distance” (which he appears in alongside “Horrible Bosses” co-star Charlie Day) and as Owen Wilson’s best friend in the Farrelly Bros. comedy “Hall Pass.” He’s a likable presence with excellent comic timing, and with what looks to be his most high-profile role to date in “Horrible Bosses,” we can’t imagine he’ll be stuck on TV for much longer.
The film’s release date was recently set as July 29th next year, a ballsy move putting it directly up against Jon Favreau’s blockbuster “Cowboys & Aliens,” suggesting that the studio hope that it could be the next “The Hangover.” With a very strong comic cast, a dark premise recalling “Strangers on a Train” and “9 To 5,” and the promise of seeing Jennifer Aniston being horribly murdered, we’re looking forward to this one, assuming director Seth Gordon can deliver something closer to his documentary classic “King of Kong” than to his studio debut “Four Christmases.”