Ed Norton plays two leading men in Grass

Tim Blake Nelson's next feature, Leaves of Grass, will star Edward Norton and...Edward Norton. This is because Norton is set to play identical twins in the film, "one an Ivy League classics professor and the other a hedonistic pot-smoking career criminal," according to Variety. Which means, despite the title of the film, we won't be seeing Norton sing of the body electric, though perhaps that's not too much of a let down.

Norton and Nelson will co-star in The Incredible Hulk, and apparently they've been getting along together quite well since Nelson wrote Grass with Norton in mind. "[He] would have been my first choice for either of these roles," Nelson told Variety. Without him, "there would have been no second choice."

"I liked it so much and felt so strongly that it was a film Tim understood to his core," Norton said. "This is exactly the kind of personal filmmaking that we set out to support."

The film will begin shooting after Norton completes his work on State of Play, which recently lost Brad Pitt as its other lead. As a result of Pitt's departure, there has been some speculation as to whether or not Play will ultimately get made now, so this could push up the production date of Grass as well.

Related links:
Paste: Norton in State of Play
Paste: The Illusionist
Tim Blake Nelson on IMDB

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