Diane Lane has signed on to star in a biopic about Triple Crown-winning racehorse Secretariat. When asked about the project, Lane told reporters "I'm just excited to finally be working with Sarah Jessica Parker." [Variety]

Oh you get so excited when you first hear that Hollywood has big plans for a zombie franchise called Deadworld. Because, even though you fear them more than anything else, you really love zombies and zombie mythology and zombie movies and zombie books. So a franchise about a post-zombie apocalypse is totally awesome. And then you read this: "Protag is King Zombie, a Harley-riding corpse who holds a grudge against the survivors who made him an outcast." And then you feel sad. Why? Because zombies don't ride motorcycles. They just don't. [Variety]

Gary Ross, who wrote and directed films like Seabiscuit and Pleasantville, has been tapped to pen the script for the biopic about cancer-surviving, pedal-pushing, wife-leaving Lance Armstrong. When asked about the project, Ross told reporters "I'm very excited. I'm hoping there's a part in here for Sarah Jessica Parker, because we had such a great time working on Seabiscuit." [THR]

Poppy Montgomery, from CBS' Without a Renewal, has signed on to star in Cinderella Pact, a Lifetime Movie Channel movie about ladies losing weight. Seriously! That's what it's about. Also, it's about a harried magazine editor. Because that's a ladyjob! [THR]

Two writers from Heroes have signed two year deals with NBC, where they'll continue to write for that drama and also develop their own projects. And I just... I mean... Heroes has writers? That NBC wants to see more of? Flabbergasted. Simply. Anyone need a roommate in LA? 'Cause they're just giving network deals out at the door, apparently. [Variety]

Matt Prokop, that dickbag from High School Musical 3: Senior Year who was like the new Troy Bolton or whatever, has just signed on to star in Furry Vengeance, a family-type comedy also starring Brendan Fraser. He'll play "a sarcastic city kid" whose mean dad moves him to rural Oregon and then they end up doing battle with animals who are mad at them. Roger Kumble, the man behind Cruel Intentions, is directing the feature, so expect a scene where Prokop has his junk ground-upon by his stone fox step-sister, and then suddenly a raccoon breaks in and everyone dies. [THR]

Oh girl, heyyyy. Lipstick Jungle's resident old lady banger Robert Buckley has landed a promotion, y'all! He's going to star on the best series on television. It's about a single plant, standing lonely atop a mound. Creatively, it's called One Tree Hill! Buckley will play a conflicted character named Jonahz, a youngish man who talks a good game and has a smooth-yet-vulnerable charm with the ladies but there's also something mysterious and maybe broken about him. Ha, actually he'll play Clayton, the "brash young sports agent" (so expect lots of lame Entourage-esque posturing), a role that Brian Austin Green had been maybe gonna do, but then that "fell through." Meaning Green finally sat down to watch an episode of the show and about ten minutes in said "Oh hellllll no." [THR]

boomp3.com

Actress Sophia Bush gave a photog the stink eye as she descended down an escalator. The photog had attached a very long lens to the camera as soon as he saw the John Tucker Must Die star at the top of the stairs, but his efforts for a money shot were quickly thwarted. Bush held her right hand over any potential "Oops!" zone and said, "Better luck tomorrow, buddy boy." After Bush passed by, the photog quickly removed the lens and muttered that Bush will rue the day that she denied him the money shot.

[Photo Credit: Splash Pics]

*A Call To The Bullpen is a work of fiction. Although the pictures we use are most certainly real, Defamer does not purport that any of the incidents or quotations you see in this piece actually happened. Lighten up, people ... it's a joke.

· NBC gets a piece of the reality cooking competition action with The Chipping Block, starring chef Marco Pierre White as The Guy Who Yells A Lot in the Big White Hat. [Variety]
· Notoriously rep-choosy auteur Steven Soderbergh, who's had no agent or manager since 2005, has settled upon Anonymous Content's Michael Sugar. So long as he doesn't get too clingy. [THR]
· Metropolitan Talent Agency is laying off most of its staff, and is close to shutting down completely. Its clients include Peter Fonda, Michael York, Debbie Reynolds, Parker Stevenson and, finally, LeVar Burton, who'll need someone to scoop him up quickly to negotiate the deal for him to star as David Paterson in Three-Diamond Girl: Ashley Alexandra Dupré and the Fall of the House of Spitzer. [THR]