Murtada here. Mean Girls alums Amanda Seyfried and Lizzy Caplan have announced upcoming projects. Amanda will star with Clive Owen in Andrew Niccol’s sci-fi thriller Anon. Niccol, the director of Gattaca (1997), and Seyfried have previously made the very forgettable In Time (2011) together. Caplan is joining Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard in an untitled period spy thriller directed by Robert Zemeicks. Set in 1942, the film follows a spy (Pitt) who falls in love and marries a French agent (Cotillard) during a dangerous WW2 mission in North Africa. Caplan will play Pitt’s sister.
More Lizzy and Amanda after the jump......
Both projects seem meh to be honest. Niccol hasn’t really made a good movie since Gattaca. And shouldn’t Caplan be starring in her own movies after her breakout in TV’s Masters of Sex. Playing second fiddle to two of the world’s brightest stars is nothing to scoff about but she deserves better.
Everyone who watched even just a few episodes of Masters of Sex knows that Caplan can break hearts then mend them immediately in the same scene. That performance should’ve given her more film opportunities than The Interview (2014) , the sequel to Now You See Me and this supporting part. Someone finance a romantic comedy for her directed by Leslye Headland, they proved they can deliver together with Bachelorette (2012).
Is Lizzy talking about studio heads?
For a while Seyfried seemed on the verge of bankable stardom. Two very successful musicals in Mamma Mia! (2008) and Les Miserables (2012), the hit Nicholas Sparks adaptation Dear John (2010), plus an indie showcase in Lovelace (2013). But somehow those led only to bit parts in silly comedies A Million ways to Die in the West (2014) and Ted 2 (2015). We know Kaplan definitely deserves a bigger career but does Seyfried? After all she was completely overshadowed by her co-stars in Noah Baumbach’s While We’re Young (2014). It might have been the thankless "girlfriend" part though. She seems stuck in mediocre films or mediocre parts when the projects are more challenging.
Besides Mean Girls, what do you think are Seyfriend and Caplan's best moments?