Will the New Mel Gibson Controversy Wreck Jodie Foster's The Beaver?

I had no doubt that the Mel Gibson/Oksana Grigorieva breakup as going to get ugly, but I guess I didn't quite anticipate it to get this ugly: Radar Online has come into some nasty tirades the actor unleashed on his ex, and it ain't pretty. The centerpiece line -- "You look like a f***ing pig in heat, and if you get raped by a pack of n***ers, it will be your fault" -- has already resuscitated memories of Gibson's infamously anti-Semitic 2006 arrest in Malibu, a blight that caused the actor to disappear from the screen until this year. In fact, 2010 was supposed to herald a comeback for Gibson, thanks to his role in Jodie Foster's quirky comedy The Beaver. Now what?

Though Gibson had tested the waters earlier this year with Edge of Darkness, his first acting role since 2004, The Beaver was meant to mark a critical renaissance for him. Foster cast him in the role of Walter Black, a depressed CEO who finds a new lease on life when he begins to communicate with friends and family via a beaver handpuppet. While Foster has been a longtime friend of Gibson's, the casting was still a gamble; still, the best-case scenario had it that with such an unexpected comic turn, perhaps Gibson could tap into the same vein that Tom Cruise struck with his Les Grossman role in Tropic Thunder (before he drove that shtick into the ground at this year's MTV Movie Awards).

Indeed, it appears Gibson is destined to ape Cruise, but not his brief comedy comeback -- instead, he's recalling the Cruise of Knight and Day, who found that his female audience (so dedicated to him once upon a time) had now deserted him and wasn't coming back.

Summit had scheduled The Beaver for October; will they movie it back to 2011 to let the controversy simmer down some? Or, when it comes to press and promotion, will they employ a very apt gambit and let Gibson do all his talking through the much friendlier avatar of Foster herself?

WORLD EXCLUSIVE: Mel Gibson's Racist Rant Caught On Tape - Tells Oksana She Would Get 'Raped By N***ers' [Radar Online]