Ballsy Move Helped Gervais Cast New Movie

Phillip Seymour Hoffman has a really good sense of humor
By Marie Morris,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 25, 2009 3:39 PM CDT

Ricky Gervais, perhaps best known for the original version of The Office, bids for movie stardom with The Invention of Lying, out next week. Gervais co-wrote, co-directed, and stars as the only person on earth with the ability to lie. He tells the Telegraph about the experience, and what jumps out is the tale of the casting of Oscar winner Philip Seymour Hoffman, who joined the cast after a somewhat unconventional approach by Gervais.

"I didn’t know Philip Seymour Hoffman," Gervais recalls, "but I sent him an email saying, 'Dear Philip, please do my new film. There’s no money as I spent the entire budget on testicular implants. But don’t think of them as my testicles, think of them as our testicles.’ He loved it, and it worked." (More Ricky Gervais stories.)

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