Tommy Lee Jones has joined the all-star cast of Robert Altman's latest film, which is based on Garrison Keillor's famous radio show "A Prairie Home Companion."

Jones joins Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, Lindsay Lohan, Virginia Madsen, Woody Harrelson, John C. Reilly, Lily Tomlin and Maya Rudolph in the untitled comedy, which is written by Keillor. Principal photography recently began in St. Paul, Minn.

The movie follows the radio show's eclectic performers, with their long-simmering passions on and off the air, who have to deal with a Texas conglomerate that buys the show and wants to end its run.

Jones will play the Axeman, a shadowy character dispatched by the conglomerate.

The film is being produced by Altman's Sandcastle 5 Prods. and financed and executive produced by GreeneStreet Films and River Road Entertainment. Capitol Films will handle the film's international sales, its third Altman picture in a row after "Gosford Park" and "The Company."

Jones starred in and directed "The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada," on which he also was a producer. The film, which has no distributor yet, won him a best actor award at the Festival de Cannes and was nominated for the Palme d'Or.

Jones is repped by WMA.