'The Spirit' finds true love with Paulson

By Borys Kit

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Sarah Paulson has joined the cast of "Will Eisner's The Spirit," comic auteur Frank Miller's directorial effort featuring the classic comic strip character.

Paulson ("Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip") joins leading ladies Eva Mendes and Scarlett Johansson in the film noir about a rookie cop (Gabriel Macht), who returns from the dead to fight crime as the Spirit from the shadows of Central City.

However, while Mendes and Johansson are playing femmes fatales, Paulson is playing the hero's true love, Dr. Ellen Dolan, the police commissioner's daughter. Samuel L. Jackson will play the villainous Octopus.

Also joining the cast are Dan Lauria, Stana Katic, Johnny Simmons and Louis Lombardi.

Lauria (ABC's miniseries "The Path to 9/11") is playing the police commissioner, while Katic ("Feast of Love") is a rookie cop. Simmons ("Evan Almighty") plays a young Denny Colt, while Lombardi (Fox's "24") will play Phobos, a henchman for the Octopus.

Production will begin in October in New Mexico. Lionsgate is scheduled to release the film domestically in 2009.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter