Sean Penn back onboard to play Larry in 'The Three Stooges'?

  Sean Penn: the next Larry in the Farrelly Brothers' "Three Stooges"?  Looks that way, folks.

The Farrelly Brothers ("There's Something About Mary", "Me, Myself, and Irene") have been trying to get their "Three Stooges" project off the ground for years, and we're now closer to that reality than ever before: Jim Carrey's been putting on weight to play Curly, the script's written, and...Sean Penn's back onboard?!  That's the rumor.  Read on for the details, my gentle Examiner readers...

The word on the street is, Sean Penn is back in line to get involved with the Farrelly Brothers' "Three Stooges" reboot.  You may recall that, last year, Penn dropped out of the film under not-so-mysterious circumstances (read: his divorce was chewing up all his time), but now that that's blown over, it looks like he's ready to suit up as Larry again.  Here, read this:

This Just In: Hollywood heavy Sean Penn, who dropped out of the Farrelly Brothers’ “Three Stooges” movie during the bust-up of his marriage, is back on board to play middle Stooge Larry, Bobby Farrelly told the Track .

“We got him back,” Bobby Farrelly told the Track. “He always said he wanted to do it after, you know, taking care of his family.”

While "The Three Stooges" haven't been relevant to comedy in decades (unless you want to get onboard the "Massive Influence" train, and go right ahead if that's your thing), the Farrelly Brothers have been pushing for this film for what seems like the past decade.  When Penn dropped out before, they Brothers tried to get Paul Giamatti on as Larry, only to come up snake-eyes on that front.  Frankly, Penn seems like the better fit, but that's not to say that Giamatti couldn't have pulled it off. 

Now that they have their Larry back and Benicio Del Toro is still interested in playing Moe, Curly still needs to be cast. There was word, way back when, that Jim Carrey was interested. But Bobby claims otherwise.

The Farrelly Brothers had moved on to another project, "Hall Pass", with Owen Wilson (Zzzz), and are to begin filming that film soon.  "Stooges" should be their next project, so stay tuned to the Comedy Examiner for more on that situation as it develops.  While you're waiting, feel free to take a look at some of these other recent Comedy Examiner articles:

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(photo: woodenspears.com)