If you recall, during TIFF James Franco revealed, that his plans for a Scott Rudin-produced adapatation of "Blood Meridian" were on hold (more on that in a second). He had shot some test footage at the end of 2010 for the film with Mark Pellegrino, Scott Glenn, Dave Franco and Luke Perry but it appears that's about as far is got. However, the multi-tasking thesp was still intent to adapt something by Cormac McCarthy and said he planned to make a film out of "Child Of God." Who knew less than six months later that it would be happening.
But apparently it is as Showbiz 411 (via The Film Stage) reports that Franco has dished to the site that he's currently lensing "Child Of God" in West Virginia with Tim Blake Nelson joining him in the cast. No word on which one is taking the role of Lester Ballard, the violent man who lives in exile outside society, dabbling in crime, necrophilia and pedophilia. Nor is it clear if this is another case of Franco shooting test footage or if it's full fledged production (you might remember, he's also shot tests for an adaptation of William Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying").
Either way McCarthy is an itch Franco has been eager to scratch, but the long awaited adaptation of "Blood Meridian" is apparently out of his hands. Showbiz 411 says "he and producer Scott Rudin fell out on a number of projects" leading to that book being canned, at least with Franco in the director's chair, leaving him to join Ridley Scott (who is now attached to the McCarthy penned script "The Counselor"), John Hillcoat and Todd Field as those who have tried and failed to get that movie off the ground.
So we'll have to wait and see how this all pans out, but it seems Franco isn't wasting a moment in getting a movie moving based on something/anything by McCarthy.