This Kid Is Pi (in Ang Lee's 'Life of Pi')

Slumdog Millionaire might finally have some competition for those plum roles Kal Penn is too old for: Ang Lee has hired unknown newcomer Suraj Sharma for the lead in his adaptation of Yann Martel's Life of Pi. Sharma will be playing the title character, who Amazon's review describes as "the precocious son of a zookeeper [who] finds himself adrift in the Pacific Ocean, trapped on a 26-foot lifeboat with a wounded zebra, a spotted hyena, a seasick orangutan, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker." The lack of wacky celebrity voice casting would seem to indicate Lee plans to keep with the tone of the book, which is a shame, because any movie with a tiger wise-cracking in the voice of Kevin James would sure make a shitload of money.