Kristen Wiig, Anna Faris and Gillian Jacobs in Lead for The Dictator, and 5 Other Stories You'll Be Talking About Today

Also in this Thursday edition of The Broadsheet: The Firm gets new life as a television show... (500) Days of the royal wedding... it's Eliot Ness versus Al Capone, again... and more ahead.

· The next Sacha Baron Cohen film has come closer to finding a female lead. THR reports that Kristen Wiig, Anna Faris and Community star Gillian Jacobs are the front-runners to land a role in the mostly improvised comedy, The Dictator. The Larry Charles-directed film would follow a deposed former dictator (Cohen) who gets lost in the United States; there's a goat herder involved, too (also Cohen), and a sidekick (potentially comedian Jason Mantzoukas, who is in talks). THR stresses that producers may decide to go with none of these three leading ladies, but here's hoping Jacobs gets the role, if only because she's been so good with so very little to do on the disappointing second season of Community. (Cue outrage in the comments.) [THR]

· It looks like that sequel to The Firm you've been waiting for may finally arrive. In television series form! eOne Television, in association with SPT networks and Paramount Pictures, will produce a 22-episode season of The Firm, and NBC is interested in buying the domestic broadcast rights. (The series will already air internationally.) Written by Lucas Reiter, The Firm would pick up ten years after the events of the John Grisham novel. [Deadline]

· Ryan Kavanaugh and Relativity Media have acquired Ness/Capone, a 2010 Black List script from writer Grant Pierce Myers. What makes this Ness/Capone movie different from all other Ness/Capone movies? Well, for starters, it presents Eliot Ness as a showboating, danger-seeking hothead, the kind of man who reveled in getting under Al Capone's skin. [Deadline]

· Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber have royal wedding fever! The (500) Days of Summer writers have sold a pitch to Sony about a young, Midwestern girl who travels to London and marries a prince. It's described as "Notting Hill meets Meet the Royal Parents," but there seems to be a bit of Gossip Girl in there as well. [Deadline]

· It looks like another David Lindsay-Abaire is headed to the big screen. The Rabbit Hole playwright will adapt Good People to movie form, with Frances McDormand set to reprise her role as a single, South Boston mother. 24 Frames states that this will all go down for Focus Features, which has yet to confirm or deny the report. [LAT/24 Frames]

· Alice Ward -- who was memorably portrayed by Melissa Leo in The Fighter -- died on Wednesday at the age of 79. Said son Dicky Eklund: "She was a great woman, a strong woman. She taught us all what it means to be strong because she never gave up on any of us." [Lowell Sun]