Two out of the three times that Jack Nicholson has worked with James L. Brooks, he got an Oscar to show for it. Looks like Nicholson is trying to repay some of that debt to his old friend, entering negotiations to join Brooks’ untitled (? — so says THR, but we last heard it was called How Do You Know?) comedy that stars Reese Witherspoon, Paul Rudd, and Owen Wilson. The film stars Witherspoon as a pro softball player who finds herself caught between a “solid guy” (Rudd) and a charming ballplayer (Wilson). Nicholson would play her father if his deal is worked out.

We told you a bit about the stellar cast of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost’s Paul a couple weeks back, but it looks like one name somehow got dropped from the list. Sigourney Weaver is also among the stars to be co-starring in the project, about two bumbling British geeks who meet an alien on their geeky American holiday and resolve to help him escape the feds and return home. Weaver’s role isn’t entirely clear yet, but she may play an older gal who first pulled the alien from his wrecked ship some 60 years prior. The Playlist has a more detailed plot synopsis along with some more information about which actors are attached to which roles.

Javier Bardem is in negotiations to join the cast of Ryan Murphy’s Eat, Pray, Love, which already stars Julia Roberts and Richard Jenkins. Based on the best-selling Elizabeth Gilbert memoir, the film would find Bardem as Felipe, the man Roberts’ character meets and falls in love with on the last leg of her journey of self-rediscovery.

Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway are looking to share the screen again (after 2006’s Brokeback Mountain), this time on the Edward Zwick-directed Love and Other Drugs. Based on the nonfiction book “Hard Sell: The Evolution of a Viagra Salesman,” the film revolves around a salesman (Gyllenhaal) for a pharmaceutical company who begins a relationship with a woman (Hathaway) afflicted with Parkinson’s disease whom he meets on one of his sales calls. A bit of bad news too, though, as with this announcement comes word that Hathaway has dropped out of the intriguing Tokyo Suckerpunch because she couldn’t match schedules with Spider-Man 4 star Tobey Maguire.

Tags: Anne Hathaway, Eay Pray Love, Edward Zwick, Greg Mottola, How Do You Know, Jack Nicholson, Jake Gyllenhaal, James L. Brooks, Javier Bardem, Love and Other Drugs, Paul, Sigourney Weaver