Hm. Noted crazy Mel Gibson will star in the film The Beaver for noted lesbian Jodie Foster, who will direct and co-star. The film, once thought to be a project for Steve Carell, is about a man who finds comfort in a beaver hand puppet. So it'll be a cheapish quirky indie type affair, although it will star one of the most vociferously strange movie stars of the past twenty years. Could be great! Could be awful. [Variety]

The Green Lantern is nearing the end of its major casting process, mulling over three actors for the lead role of a hotshot Air Force pilot who meets a dying alien and gets deputized into a space police department. (That is an actual plot of a movie. And a comic book!) Warner Brothers is trying to decide between Bradley Cooper, Ryan Reynolds, and Justin Timberlake, of all people, but is apparently having some trouble reconciling their favorite with the director's. So we'll either get a kind of boring Green Lanternt, a wise-cracking kind of annoying Green Lantern, or a singin' dancin' Green Lantern. None of which sound terribly thrilling. [THR]

The Minnie Driver/Uma Thurman comedy Motherhood, which premiered at Sundance this year, has set an October release date. The movie is about a crazed mommy trying to plan a birthday party for her daughter while the crazy city world provides obstacles along the way. Obstacles like Isn't This Basically the Plot of Jingle All the Way and Uma Thurman Is Never Funny. [Variety]

Quirky comedy queen Zooey Deschanel has signed on to play James Franco's love interest in the David Gordon Green comedy Your Highness, about a lazy prince (Danny McBride) who must go on a quest to save his kingdom. Other than the fact that Natalie Portman plays McBride's wildly disproportionate love interest, this film is weird because it looks as though Gordon Green really is going down this broad comedy route. Will we ever get a George Washington, All the Real Girls, or Snow Angels again? [THR]

Nicole Kidman will star in and produce a movie version of the book Little Bee, about a wealthy British couple who has an encounter with a Nigerian orphan while on an African vacation. No word yet on whether Jerry Seinfeld will voice the orphan character. [Variety]

Everwood surly teen Gregory Smith has joined the cast of that Canadian Grey's Anatomy-with-badges police drama Copper that will air on ABC in the States. Treat Williams is wondering if maybe there's a part for a tough-but-principled chief or something. [THR]

Ugh. Shoulda-been-gone-by-now Napoleon Dynamite star Jon Heder has landed a Comedy Central sitcom. It's about a laid-off IT worker who leaves his urban life to return home to the small town where he grew up. Which has been the idea for basically everything these days. In a nifty little distribution deal, if the sitcom's first batch of episodes do well, an automatic 90 more will be ordered. Yeesh. [Variety]

Be excited for: Flash Forward, the new ABC mindbender about the Hoffs/Drawler Funeral Parlor, Joel McHale's comedy about community college, and a second season of Parks & Recreation. These are shows that the networks are pitching to ad folks as exciting members of their new fall lineup. My Name Is Earl might be canceled. So. He giveth, and He taketh away. [Variety]

Marcus Nispel, who directed that beautifully-filmed-but-scary-and-awful Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake, is in talks to steer The Last Voyage of the Demeter, about the Bulgarian boat that Dracula is aboard and everyone dies. It's in Bram Stoker's book, which was based on Francis Ford Coppola's movie, I'm pretty sure. [Variety]

Warner Bros. has acquired the rights to Japanese manga series Death Note, which they plan to make into a live-action movie. The series is about a guy who gets a magical power which enables him to kill anyone just by writing their name down on a piece of paper. We hear Dick Cheney's a fan. [Variety]

I... hm. So? Well. Here's the— Eesh. OK. Hot Tub Time Machine. Is the name of a movie. And it's about exactly what it sounds like it's about. John Cusack and Rob Corddry are in it. And now so are Crispin Glover, Lizzie Kaplan, and Kings boombalottie Sebastian Stan. It's about old friends who travel back to 1987 in a magical hot tub. I guess it's like a throwbacky kinda comedy? 80's comedy pastiche/homage? About a time traveling hot tub? The world is maybe out of ideas? [THR]

Jim Carrey might star in The Beaver, that buzzed-about comedy about a guy who has a relationship with his beaver hand puppet. So Jim Carrey wouldn't be the beaver. Even though he looks like... Anyway, Jodie Foster might direct! [THR]

Oh how faaabulous. Barry Levinson is doing a movie about coming of age in 1960's Baltimore. It's totally not Liberty Heights! That was set in the 50's! [THR]

Congratulations. Your life's dream has been realized. Disney has renewed Wizards of Waverly Place for a third season, plus there's going to be a movie this summer. For those of you who would call star Selena Gomez a rat-faced menace, you people are just crazy. And for those of you who harbor illicit desires for that kid who plays her older brother, well... Happy May Day! Ha! [THR]

The scripts are then ranked according to numbers of mentions, then the list is distributed throughout the industry, adding luster to projects that might be otherwise languishing as a makeshift agency doorstop or on the floor of an assistant's Jetta. What once was a handily distributed insider's guide, however, has now exploded upon the mainstream through the power of the blogosphere; corporate interest followed soon after, and as we now understand it, any combination of the words "The," "Black," and "List" now requires by law that we acknowledge EW.com working in affiliation with Deadline Hollywood Daily Industries. (We don't ask questions, we just submit.) This year's top spot went to The Beaver, a Steve Carell-attached project that first came our attention early in November, in which he plays a down-on-his-luck toy manufacturer who develops an intense relationship with a beaver hand puppet he discovers in a dumpster. We're certain the magical-realist elements, combined with the fun-to-say title ("Two for The Beaver, please." "Can I bring my son into The Beaver? He's only 14." "Hello, Arclight? Is The Beaver totally packed tonight, or can you squeeze me in?") will ensure it will be only a matter of time before that project jumps from The Black List to critical Top Ten lists across the country.

Synopses of the ten most mentioned screenplays follow, courtesy of EW.com:

1. THE BEAVER, Kyle Killen
Walter Black, a depressed toy manufacturer, loses his family and his business. But then Walter tries on a hand puppet — a chatty British rodent called ''The Beaver'' — and his personality is transformed. It's all good at first, but things turn ugly when the puppet won't let go.

2. THE ORANGES, Jay Reiss and Ian Helfer
Two New Jersey families are thrown into comic turmoil when the prodigal daughter returns for Christmas and falls in love with her parents' best friend.

3. BUTTER,
 Jason Micallef
Destiny, a black foster child, faces off against Iowa's reigning dairy diva, the beautiful but venal Laura Pickler, in an epic butter-carving competition for the ages.

4. BIG HOLE, Michael Gilio
Lee, an old, grumpy ex-cowboy, loses $30,000 to a fraudulent sweepstakes company
 and sets out to punish those responsible. Lee's son, the local sheriff, is charged with stopping him.

5. THE LOW DWELLERd, Brad Ingelsby
Charlie ''Slim'' Hendrick, a don't-eff-with-me ex-con, returns home to find that his sweetie has moved on and his bitter brother has gambling debts. When a disfigured, dog-loving thug beats his sibling to death, Slim seeks vengeance.

6. F***BUDDIES,
 Liz Meriwether
Emma and Adam have the best 
relationship ever! They're twentysomething pals who, you know, do it. A lot. But then Adam goes and falls in love with Emma and ruins everything. Can their perfect non-union survive?

7. WINTER'S DISCONTENT, Paul Fruchbom
After the death of his wife of more than 
50 years, irrepressible horndog Herb Winter sets out, at age 75, to find sexual fulfillment with another woman. Or, if possible, 
several.

8. BROKEN CITY, Brian Tucker
The New York mayor asks private eye Billy Taggart to find out if the mayor's wife is cheating on him. She is, with the campaign director of the mayor's political rival, no less, who soon turns up dead. Did 
Billy's investigation lead to murder?

9. I'M WITH CANCER, Will Reiser
Adam, a 25-year-old single Jewish dude, is diagnosed with 
 spinal cancer. Hilarity 
 ensues. Seriously.

10. OUR BRAND IS CRISIS, Peter Straughan
A team of American political operatives moves to Bolivia to take on a flailing presidential campaign. Loosely based on the 2006 
documentary of the same name.

• Exclusive! The 10 Best Unproduced Scripts in Hollywood, a.k.a., the Black List [EW]

In what's being referred to as a "winning, whimsical" story splitting the difference between Being John Malkovich and Lars and the Real Girl, Carell would portray a man who develops a close relationship with a beaver hand puppet, "treating it as something close to a human creature with human feelings." Every studio around wants it, but producer Anonymous Content is waiting to land a director before actively shopping the project.

On that front, Jay Roach has already turned it down, while other candidates' replies await. Obviously, of course, this sounds like a job for Brett Ratner, whose string of hits speaks for itself and whose finely honed sense of metaphor can only enhance to the multidimensionality of the title character. That is a DVD commentary we would pay good money to hear.

• Steve Carell could make 'Beaver' speak [THR]