The last year has been a very good one for high profile comedies, with several new movies that have been both hilarious and very profitable. When that magic mixture is achieved you can be sure that the principles are going to be getting a lot more work.

Two of the more surprising successes of the year were Bridesmaids and Horrible Bosses and now it looks like key members from both films are joining forces on their next project. Deadline is exclusively reporting that director Seth Gordon has tapped Melissa McCarthy to star along side his Horrible Bosses star Jason Bateman in his next film, Identity Theft.

McCarthy was one of the best parts of Bridesmaids and has made a lot of strides towards mainstream popularity in the last twelve months. Between an Emmy for her work in Mike & Molly and stealing the show on a recent Saturday Night Live, it will be interesting to see if she can parlay that momentum into starring role success.

Seth Gordon, on the other hand, is finally showing off why people were excited about his vision after his great debut documentary The King of Kong. Hopefully working together will bring their careers to new levels of greatness, because the world can always use great female comedy leads and strong comedy directors.

Even though this website could technically be called a “Blog” and those of us who contribute to it are known as “Bloggers,” we like to think of ourselves as writers. So, when other writers get recognized, as they have by the Writer’s Guild of America’s nominations for it’s awards today, we take notice.

We also take notice when movies that seem an odd choice for awards get nominated anyway. We will leave it to you, good readers, to decide which of the following nominees for Writers Guild awards seems a bit out of place.

Winners will be announced at the 2012 Writers Guild Awards on Sunday, February 19, 2012, during simultaneous ceremonies in Hollywood and New York. Check out all the nominees (and more) from the official press release:

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

50/50, Written by Will Reiser; Summit Entertainment

Bridesmaids, Written by Annie Mumolo & Kristen Wiig; Universal Studios

Midnight in Paris, Written by Woody Allen; Sony Pictures Classics

Win Win, Screenplay by Tom McCarthy; Story by Tom McCarthy & Joe Tiboni; Fox Searchlight

Young Adult, Written by Diablo Cody; Paramount Pictures

In case you didn’t realize it, there’s a lot of groups in Hollywood that like to give awards. From the Screen Actors Guild to the Writers Guild to the big one, the Academy Awards, it often seems that Hollywod loves awards as much as it likes making movies.

Besides the ones mentioned above, there’s another group that gives awards each year: film and TV producers. That group, collectively known as the Producers Guild of America or PGA, has released its nominations today and we’ve got them for you, and the rest of their press release, below. Check it out.

LOS ANGELES, CA (January 3, 2012) – The Producers Guild of America (PGA) announced today the motion picture and long-form television nominations for the 23rd Annual Producers Guild Awards. The categories include: The Darryl F. Zanuck Producer of the Year Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures; The Producers Guild of America Producer of the Year Award in Animated Theatrical Motion Pictures; and The David L. Wolper Producer of the Year Award in Long-Form Television. The documentary film category and other television category nominations were already announced by the Guild in December 2011.

All 2012 Producers Guild Award winners will be announced on January 21, 2012 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. This year, the Producers Guild will also award special honors to Leslie Moonves (Milestone Award), Steven Spielberg (David O. Selznick Achievement Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures), Don Mischer (Norman Lear Achievement Award in Television), Stan Lee (Vanguard Award), and IN THE LAND OF BLOOD AND HONEY (The Stanley Kramer Award). The 2012 Producers Guild Awards co-chairs are Paula Wagner and Michael Manheim.

The Screen Actors Guild annually awards excellence in screen acting, and has quickly become one of the more prestigious year end awards. The SAG awards are usually a solid indicator for Oscar glory in the acting categories, so seeing a few these names on this nominations list is a little surprising.

Chief among the unexpected nominees is the cast of Bridesmaids and Jonah Hill for Moneyball. Well deserved nominations, but certainly a tad shocking considering the strong year for acting all around. On the more expected front Modern Family takes in five acting nominations in just three categories.

I also appreciate that the awards honor stunt workers as well, this allows the Screen Actors Guild to broaden the scope of films they salute, and shines a light on a very important aspect of film making. The awards will be handed out Sunday, January 29th.

The full list of nominees after the jump:

Here we are, week 3 into a seemingly never-ending summer of huge named blockbusters, and the first film to come close to $100 million in the domestic box office is the fourth installment of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.

With a budget of nearly $250 million, the film opened wide this weekend to over 4,100 screens across the country and pulled in an estimated $90.1 million since Friday. Not to mention its overseas numbers, which totaled in over $250 million worldwide.

Coming in behind the film, Bridesmaids only went down $4 million from last weekend’s $26 million to an estimated $21 million. This is a perfect example of word-of-mouth helping a film out, as the marketing normally dies down after the first weekend of a film’s release.

Doing less impressive, Paramount’s Thor lost half of its totals from last weekend, bringing it in at third with an estimated $15.5 million. Worry not, however, as the film has brought in nearly $400 million worldwide since its release date.

Week 3 into this year’s epic summer blockbuster season and it looks like established franchises seem to still be more of a draw than original comedies or futuristic thrillers. In its second week of release, Thor has maintained the coveted #1 spot over new releases Bridesmaids and Priest.

Last weekend, Thor opened to 3,955 theaters in the US and had a solid pull of $65.7 million. This weekend, the film opened up in a few more theaters but lost a little bit of steam and about 50% of the original weekend’s domestic take, in making an estimated $34.5 million domestic, and over $300 million worldwide.

In the new releases, Bridesmaids, starring Kristen Wiig and marketed as the “female Hangover” came in at the #2 spot with $24.4 million. Not a terrible opening weekend, as the film only cost $32 million to make. It will be a nice companion film to Hangover 2, which hits in 2 weeks.

The only other big release this weekend was Priest, starring Paul Bettany and Karl Urban. In remaining consistent with less than positive reviews, the film opened at #4 with a measly $14.5 million. This is definitely one film that was hurt by the 3D conversion, as it pushed the release back from over a year ago, when it had a chance to stand strong in a dead weekend.

If you dismiss Bridesmaids as an estrogen laden raunch fest, you’d be selling it short. Not only is the film wickedly funny, but it has a surprising amount of heart to boot. How refreshing to see a talented ensemble of women deliver the goods on every level.

Kristen Wiig really gets to strut her stuff as Annie, an adorable underachiever who just can’t catch a break since she lost her bakery during the recession. She occasionally beds down with a handsome prick (John Hamm) who kicks her out of the sack the minute he has done the dirty deed. A real charmer, there. Adding to her misery is her boring job selling jewelry.

When Annie’s best friend Lillian (Maya Rudolph) becomes engaged, she asks Annie to be her maid of honor. However, their friendship is tested when Lillian’s new (and obscenely wealthy) friend Helen (Rose Byrne) starts honing in on the wedding planning.

A jealous rivalry begins escalating between the two as the events leading up to the wedding unfold. Poor Annie is roped into buying an expensive designer bridesmaid dress she can’t afford and is subjected to the most over-the-top bridal shower ever.