The thinly-populated genre of ice hockey comedies has produced exactly one classic: George Roy Hill’s gloriously profane “Slap Shot.” The likes of “The Mighty Ducks” trilogy and the underrated Russell Crowe vehicle “Mystery, Alaska” have tried valiantly, but nothing’s ever quite come close to the joy of seeing Paul Newman and the Hanson Brothers kick the living shit out of people on an ice rink.
For whatever reason, the sport seems to be back in vogue, with hockey obsessive Kevin Smith still planning to shoot “Hit Somebody” next year, after he finishes horror comedy “Red State.” But more imminent is “Goon,” the Canadian comedy written by Apatow staples Jay Baruchel and Evan Goldberg (the latter co-wrote “Superbad” and “Pineapple Express”). Seann William Scott joined the project in the summer, with Baruchel also appearing, while Alison Pill and Marc-Andre Grondin joined the project last week, and now another terrific actor has joined the increasingly promising ensemble.
The Wrap reports that Liev Schreiber has come on board the project in an unknown role (hopefully not a villain — *spoiler* as soon as he popped up in “Salt,” it was thunderingly obvious who the bad guy would turn out to be). Production Weekly tweeted last week that Schreiber was circling both this and a thriller called “Jack” with Samuel L. Jackson, and, while there’s no word on the latter, The Wrap confirmed Mr. Naomi Watts’ presence in “Goon.”
The site also have the first log-line we’ve seen for the project: supposedly, Scott will star ‘as a bouncer who joins a rag-tag hockey team and inspires them to greatness.’ Baruchel plays his best friend, Grondin will be a French-Canadian hockey star, and Pill will be the female lead. Even though the shadow of “Slap Shot” looms over this, the level of talent involved (particularly with the new presence of Schreiber, who doesn’t get to do comedy as much as we’d like) has us extremely excited about this one. Shooting starts in Winnipeg next month, under the eye of “FUBAR” director Michael Dowse.