Seth Rogen will portray a Jewish immigrant pickle maker and his great-grandson in a new untitled comedy for Sony Pictures. The project casts Rogen as Herschel Greenbaum, who comes to America in 1918 and finds work in a pickle factory. He falls into a vat of pickles and gets preserved in brine for a century. When he emerges in present day New York, he’s the same age as his lookalike great-grandson Ben, also played by Rogen. The actor will produce the movie, expected to begin shooting in October in Pittsburgh.
Rogen has several other films in the works or on the calendar. In the comedy “Flarsky,” he plays the title role, a journalist who becomes part of a presidential candidate’s (Charlize Theron) inner circle. Also starring Andy Serkis and Alexander Skarsgard, it will be released June 7. Due out the following month, Jon Favreau’s live action/CGI hybrid remake of “The Lion King” features Rogen as the voice of Pumbaa the warthog.
Awaiting release dates are “Zeroville,” a James Franco-directed Hollywood comedy-drama set in 1969, and “Newsflash,” in which Rogen plays newscaster Walter Cronkite in a story of the John F. Kennedy assassination seen from the point of view of the man who first reported it on live television.