Paul Rudd + Zach Galifianakis + Free will = New quirky comedy

The bad thing about being the directors of Little Miss Sunshine is that for the three years after it came out, Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris had to keep answering the “So, how are you going to follow that?” question?

Understandably, it was a difficult question for the married duo to answer because when the first feature film you direct goes from being a typical indie film with financing problems, budget shortcuts, and a bevy of producers to grossing over $100 million worldwide and being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, you kinda have to pick your next project carefully.

So far, two films have been attributed to being under their care (Used Guys and The Abstinence Teacher, but it’s this latest one that I think really has the legs to go the distance.

According to Variety, the pair will be directing Paul Rudd in Will for Paramount Pictures, with Zach Galifianakis in negotiations to co-star.

The plot is described as follows:

Story centers on an ordinary guy (Rudd) who lives in a world where people’s lives and destinies are being written by scribes in Heaven. The man wakes up one day to find that his heavenly writer has decided to no longer draft his life, and he must go about his day unscripted.

That makes it feel like Stranger Than Fiction in reverse, but I think I’m kinda digging the magical realism of a world where people know for certain that someone is in charge of their destinies and what happens to someone who suddenly has to be in charge of himself.

Upon finding out that Demetri Martin originally pitched the movie to Dreamworks and that Paramount got custody of it when they broke up in 2008, it makes me wonder if Martin is also in negotiations to be involved as either a scriptwriter or part of the cast, and I think he’d be great doing either.