Justin Timberlake In Talks to Add Another Jerky Role to His Jerky Role-Studded Resume

By  · Published on September 26th, 2012

In a shocking turn of casting events, Variety reports that strolling troubadour and star of The Love Guru, Justin Timberlake, is in talks to star in a new film that would see the former boy band balladeer playing kind of a jerk. Heavens! The outlet reports that Timberlake is looking to star in Peter Sollett’s (Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist) The Last Drop, which would see him as “a charming alcoholic who works as a restaurant critic for New York Magazine” who decides to clean up his wicked ways in order to win the love of a good woman. We will now take bets as to just how irrepressibly awful and jerky Timberlake’s character will be before he gets off the sauce.

Timberlake has previously played charming jerks in films like The Social Network, Trouble With the Curve, Alpha Dog, Southland Tales, and (somewhat arguably) Yogi Bear.

The film comes from a Black List script by Brandon and Phil Murphy. The script earned 9 votes that year on the list of Hollywood’s “most liked” unproduced scripts. Its official List synopsis expands a bit beyond Variety’s logline, telling us that is centers on “a fully functioning alcoholic meets the girl of his dreams and soon discovers that there’s a lot more at stake than love if he doesn’t clean up his act.” Stakes!

For reference, other scripts that earned nine votes in 2011 included Brian Duffield’s Jane Got a Gun, Harper Dill’s Friend of Bill, and Stefan Jaworski’s The Last Witness. The top vote-getter in 2011 was Graham Moore’s The Imitation Game, which received 133 votes.

The outlet also notes that the Murphys “recently wrote a drama for Richard Branson’s Virgin Produced about the relationship between Rolling Stones members Mick Jagger and Keith Richards as the band recorded its classic ‘Exile on Main Street’ album. They’re also developing a Steve McQueen biopic for Sony and producer Jerry Weintraub.” In short, they sound like pretty cool dudes.