Annette Bening joins the Zoe Kazan penned flick He Loves Me!

Via Variety:

Annette Bening has found her first project since earning an Oscar nomination for "The Kids Are All Right," as the actress is in negotiations to play Paul Dano's mother in Fox Searchlight's "He Loves Me."

Dano stars as Calvin, a once-great novelist who is creativity blocked due to heartache and loneliness. That changes when he writes his dream girl, who comes to life to be his girlfriend. That role will be played by Dano's real-life girlfriend, Zoe Kazan, who also wrote the script.

Bening will play Gertrude, apainter who's curious about Calvin's new girlfriend but worried about how much he hates her second husband, a hippie named Mort.

Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris are directing the pic as their followup to "Little Miss Sunshine," which co-starred Dano and was released by Fox Searchlight. Project also reunites the trio with "Sunshine" producers Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa, who will produce "He Loves Me" through their Bona Fide Prods. banner.

Production is slated to start next month.

Bening is repped by CAA.

-Joey's Two Cents: I'm very intrigued by this project, and casting Bening is never a bad thing...thoughts?

Have the duo behind Little Miss Sunshine finally set their next film in motion?

They sure seem to have, and it's from an interesting source. Here's the story from The Playlist:

It’s been five years since 2006’s “Little Miss Sunshine” and while directing duo Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris have had several projects in development, earlier this year it was finally revealed the duo we pushing forward with “He Loves Me.” Written by actress Zoe Kazan who will co-star in the picture with her real-life boyfriend Paul Dano, the project is a meta-strange sounding road-trip film that centers on a young novelist who achieves success early in his career but begins to face struggles. It has been described as a blend of “Adaptation” and “Weird Science,” as the young protagonist follows the advice of writing the woman he thinks will love him in a bid to overcome his writer’s block. Here’s the strange part, through this odd exercise he ends up willing her into existence.

Sounds fascinating and certainly ambitious, but considering “Little Miss Sunshine” was a smash $100 million hit, it’s no surprise that Fox Searchlight are once again back in the fold. According to Deadline, the film is now primed to start shooting in July and moreover Jeff Bridges is being sought for an unknown role. We’d guess his participation will depend on his promotional schedule for his debut album which will be released by Blue Note in August. The actor also has the big budget “The Seventh Son” with Julianne Moore, Sam Clafin and Alicia Vikander on the horizon but that is slated to shoot later in the year and shouldn’t conflict with “He Loves Me.”

We’re glad Dayton/Faris are back and excited they are tackling some truly original material. “He Loves Me” looks to be coming out of the gate with some impressive talent and there’s more surely to come as the film heads into production.

-Joey's Two Cents: Everything about this project sounds right up my alley. Color me very interested...thoughts?