BAWK BAWK. “Willie Beamen, come quick, the world needs you!” “Not now, little girl, I’m in disguise.”

I used to hate Sony’s Annie remake on account of it being another Will Smith vanity project starring one of his obnoxious little fame avatar children. But Willow got too old to play the lead, and Quvenzhane Wallis (I just won Scrabble!) from Beasts of the Southern Wild was cast. I guess I don’t hate it as much now, but I really hope Hollywood doesn’t ruin that adorable little girl’s life. Anyway, now Jamie Foxx has been cast as Daddy Warbucks. Only they’re calling him “Benjamin Stacks” in this one. Get it? Because it’s an African-American remake, and “stacking Benjamins” is African-American talk for making lots of money. I heard they tried to do an African-American remake of The Rainmaker but… you know what, I’m not even going to finish this joke.

Jamie Foxx is in negotiations to star opposite Quvenzhane Wallis in Annie, the update of the classic comic strip-turned-musical that Sony is making with producers Will Smithand Jay-Z.

Foxx would play a character named Benjamin Stacks, a variation of the Daddy Warbucks personage, who takes in the spunky orphan girl being played by Wallis. (You know he’s rich because his name literally means stacks of $100 bills, aka Benjamins.)

I admire the restraint it took not to spell it “Benjamin Staxx.” That never would’ve happened had Vin Diesel been producing.

The Django Unchained star has received an offer from the studio and sources say his team has begun to negotiate.

Will Gluck is directing the project, which has a host of producers: Smith and his Overbrook Entertainment banner partner James Lassiter, Jada Pinkett-Smith and Jay-Z. Also producing are Jay Brown and Tyran “Ty Ty” Smith through Marcy Media. [THR]

This project used to be fun to make fun of at least, but now it’s like a yawn wrapped in shrugs. I guess that’s a good thing, because if I had to watch one of Will Smith’s millionaire brats rapping about her “hard knock life,” I might’ve had an aneurysm. “At least he died watching something he hated,” people would say.

“Please… please stop taking pictures of our children… they just want to be normal kids.”

Last year, then-11-year old Willow Smith caused an Internet uproar when she Tweeted a picture of herself with what looked like a tongue ring while bragging that she got a tongue ring. And people clearly believed that she would get her tongue pierced because she dresses like this and has hair like this, so it just seemed logical. It turned out, though, that she was just playin, y’all, because she just wanted to watch everyone overreact. Take that, you poor adults working hard to pay bills, whatever those are.

But the timing was convenient, because it reminded us that not only were her father, Will Smith, and rap superstar Jay-Z producing a remake of the classic musical Annie, and not only were they trying to get Emma Thompson to write it, but it was also starring Willow. After all, her brother got to be Karate Kid for Halloween so she should get to be Annie.

Except now she doesn’t want to do it anymore. “Gosh dad, just give me a million dollars and leave me alone!”

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“You named your kid what?”

Last time I wrote about the fad of naming babies after characters from TV shows, movies or books, I caught some serious hell from people who had indeed chosen their kids’ names that way. Specifically from the Game of Thrones faction. But as someone who was named after a movie character – albeit one with an ordinary name – my stance on this practice remains strong, in that I really suggest that people not do it, for the sake of their child’s self-esteem and such. Wedgies hurt, people.

That said, this year’s most popular names aren’t in yet, but that isn’t stopping the fine folks at Nameberry from taking on the “Most Outrageous Baby Names of 2012”, with the big winner going to “Blue”, as in Blue Ivey Carter, the daughter of Jay Z and Beyonce. Apparently colors were a big naming influence this year, and get ready to choke yourself with a tie.

Blue: The year was bookended by Blue, the name and color of 2012. January saw the much-anticipated birth of Blue Ivy, the daughter of Beyonce and Jay-Z, who quickly moved to trademark their child’s singular name. And 2012 culminated in the reelection of Democratic President Obama and a political swing toward the blue. Other color names on the rise include Silver, as in political prognosticator Nate, Scarlett, Violet, and Grey, as in erotic hit “50 Shades.”

That’s right, couples are naming their newborn boys after Christian Grey from the best-selling erotic bondage novel, Fifty Shades of Grey. I really look forward to the day this conversation happens…

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If there’s one thing I love, it’s rap music. If there are two things I love, they’re rap music and action-y action movies. And if there are three things I love, they’re rap music, action-y action movies, and crappy things that are haphazardly thrown together. (This is why my favorite movie is “any movie starring DMX.”) So it should come as no surprise that this trailer for Shawn Carter has me all giggles and bubble gum over here.

Basically, some hero took the trailer for John Carter, put a picture of Jay-Z (real name, Shawn Carter) over Taylor Kitsch’s face during the whole thing, and replaced his dialogue with lines from Jay-Z’s songs. It not particularly “good” or “seamless” by any means. It looks kind of like one of those little kid art projects where you make a doll by gluing someone’s picture onto the top of a popsicle stick, but that’s part of its charm. If it was any slicker, I probably wouldn’t like it. The only downside is that it’s so simple and perfect that now I’m furious I didn’t come up with it first.

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No one in Hollywood makes me want to puke as much as the Smith family (the daughter’s named Willow after the dad! the son’s named Jaden after the mom! God, they’re like black Mormons), but I’ll give Will Smith this, he buys great birthday presents.  He bought a Karate Kid remake for his son, even though no one in the world gives a crap about an 11-year-old lead — to quote Royal Tenenbaum, “What characters? It’s just a bunch of little kids in costumes,” — and his daughter must’ve gotten jealous, because he bought her a remake of Annie. And now he’s trying to get Emma Thompson to write the screenplay.  At first I figured he’d just seen Stranger than Fiction too many times, but it turns out she does actually

Insiders say Will Smith and Jay-Z are in negotiations with Oscar-winning screenwriter [Best Actress in 1992 for Howard's End and Best Adapted Screenplay in 1995 for Sense and Sensibility] and actress Emma Thompson to re-adapt the screenplay for an updated version of the musical that would star Smith’s youngest progeny, Willow.
If the deal with Thompson goes through, the project will be the first fruit of the partnership between Smith and Jay-Z that Columbia Pictures announced back in January, but it won’t be the first time that these principals have worked together: Thompson is currently co-starring with Smith as Agent O in Men in Black III, while Jay-Z, Smith, and his spouse, Jada Pinkett-Smith, all served as co-producers of the Broadway musical Fela!, nominated for eleven Tony awards last year. [Vulture]

A remake of Annie starring Will Smith’s daughter, who’s 10.  And Jay-Z supposedly still has credibility?  F*ck that guy.  The only thing I want to see Willow Smith in a remake of Willow, where it’s just her fending off attacks by an angry dwarf who bites.  Warwick Davis would be cool, but any dwarf with teeth, really.