Diane Kruger, coming off her best actress win at the Cannes Film Festival, has joined Steve Carell in Universal’s untitled Robert Zemeckis project.
The movie is casting up ahead of its fall shoot and the call sheet already includes Leslie Mann, Janelle Monae and Baby Driver actress Eiza Gonzalez.
The feature is based on Jeff Malmberg’s 2010 documentary Marwencol, which followed a man who builds a miniature World War II-era village with action figures and dolls as a way to recover from a violent assault. The studio is describing the project as “one broken man’s fight as he discovers how artistic imagination can restore the human spirit.”
Carell is the broken man who builds the miniature set, with Zemeckis creating an entire WWII-set fantasy village that the character escapes to, populated by the man’s real-world alter egos.
Kruger will play Deja Thoris, the Belgian Witch of Marwen who, in a recurring scenario, revives Carell’s alter ego every time he is killed by Nazis.
Monae and Gonzalez have been cast as other women in the village, while Mann will portray a real-world woman who takes an interest in Carell’s hobby.
Zemeckis co-wrote the screenplay with Caroline Thompson. He is also producing via his Universal-based ImageMovers, along with Jack Rapke and Steve Starkey, as well as Cherylanne Martin.
Kruger is basking in the glow of her Cannes win for her starring role in In the Fade, a German revenge drama from director Fatih Akin. The actress is also set to star with Kristen Stewart and Laura Dern in the drama JT Leroy.
Kruger is repped by UTA, Untitled, Altitude Management and Peikoff/Mahan.
