With the passing of Bob Denver recently (he truly made a lot of people laugh), I remembered a dinner Jackie and I had a couple of years ago with friends. Maybe it was the second bottle of wine but we got into this insane head-space where we spent the evening "casting" the feature film version of Gilligan's Island. I know there's the New Gilligan's Island reality show, but forget that. In our feature version, the cast alone would have cost $100-million bucks before cameras even rolled.
Since that dinner -- and since even this post -- it's become a parlor game. So, here's the state-of-the-art "Dream Team" new cast -- moving left to right -- across the picture of the original cast --
- The Professor (Hugh Grant)
- Mary Anne (Reese Witherspoon)
- Gilligan (Topher Grace)
- Ginger (Nicole Kidman)
- Mr. Howell (Dan Ackroyd)
- Mrs. Howell (Stockard Channing)
- The Skipper (John Goodman)
In that original dinner casting session, we originally had Jim Carey as Gilligan, Elizabeth Hurley as Ginger, Bill Cosby and Phylica Rashad as the Howells and Sandra Bullock as Mary Anne. But, hey, something as important as casting Gilligan: The Movie is too important to be left static. This is a dynamic process. If you have a better idea, write a comment and we'll update!
