Hollywood has been trying to bring the saga of Russ Meyer on the big screen, and why not? The filmmaker had an outsized life, and loved uh, outsized women, and put his own, weird mark on cinematic history. Way back in 2011, David O. Russell was planning a Russ Meyer biopic, written by “Lovelace” screenwriter Merritt Johnson, but that seems to have disappeared. However, last fall a new project popped up titled, "Russ & Roger Go Beyond," and it will detail one of most curious chapters in the lives of both Russ Meyer and legendary film critic Roger Ebert, with a big star eyeballing one of the lead roles.
Deadline reports that Will Ferrell is circling the part of Russ Meyer in the Christopher Cluess (“The Simpsons,” “SNL”)-penned movie that will tell the tale of Ebert and Meyer, who traveled to Hollywood and the 20th Century Fox lot to write “Beyond Valley of the Dolls.” It was as unlikely a pairing as you can imagine, and it’s even stranger that a major studio would allow these two to create campy send-up of Hollywood in general, but it was 1960s, and it seems there was no idea that was a bad idea.
Now, apparently ‘Russ & Roger’ is on the fast track, but it also needs a director. And while Deadline says Edgar Wright has shown interest, his next movie is "Baby Driver" so he’s probably not going to do this. We presume any movement at all will depend on Ferrell actually signing up for the indie production. So we’ll see what winds up happening.