icreator Seth MacFarlane will direct Mark Wahlberg in his fanciful, R-rated feature debut, Deadline reports. This is confirmation from an earlier rumor via Pajiba.
MacFarlane’s directorial debut, Ted, will star Wahlberg as a regular Boston fella whose childhood wish – that his teddy bear would come to life – not only came true, but may end up ruining his life. The bear – to be voiced by MacFarlane (who voices the majority of the characters on his perennial hit Family Guy and voices the main character on American Dad and is already the voice of the French bear on his Family Guy spinoff, The Cleveland Show) is on the verge of ruining Wahlberg‘s life as he tries to commit to the girl he loves and build a real, adult life for himself. The bear, which will apparently be a CGI creation, has grown up to be a drunken slacker.
Am I the only one who thinks this sounds perfect for both of these stars? MacFarlane and Wahlberg are New England transplants who have risen to the top of their fields. MacFarlane is the highest-paid writer in television at the moment, whose hit cartoon sitcom, Family Guy, has firmly eclipsed The Simpsons as the most influential, outrageous and relevant animated comedy of our day.
With Wahlberg coming off the hit buddy comedy (with Will Ferrell), The Other Guys and already scaring up Oscar buzz for his yet-to-be-released turn as boxer “Irish” Mickey Ward in David O. Russell’s The Fighter, this looks like another chance to stretch his comic muscles (he stole the entire show in I Heart Huckabees and was kinda funnier than Ferrell in The Other Guys). And it’s really about time MacFarlane stepped into the live-action arena.
Does the pairing of Mark Wahlberg and Seth MacFarlane sound good to you?