Here’s another round of script news we’ve excavated from the trades. As usual, we read them so you don’t have to. This week we’ll tell you about the back end of the filmmaking process with news on scripts from George Clooney, Stephanie Meyer and the all elusive Warren Beatty. (So elusive that younger readers might not know who he is…)

George Clooney’s thriller “The Ides of March” is set to debut as a wide release this October but will premiere first at the Venice Film Festival this August. Clooney directed the film from a script he wrote with Grant Heslov. The story is an adaptation of the Broadway play “Farragut North”. The playbook was written by Beau Willmon.

Speaking of thrillers, we previously reported on the Nicolas Cage/Nicole Kidman thriller “Trespass”. The film is now set for a fall release after Millenium Entertainment picked up distribution rights. Karl Gajdusek wrote the script which centers around the after-effects of a violent home invasion. (You may remember that an acclaimed home invasion flick was released last weekend titled “Kidnapped”. Is the genre on the rise? If so, why do you think?)

Warren Beatty is set to return to filmmaking after a ten year absence. His last directing project was “Bulworth” which came out in 1998, and though it’s not much talked about now it was a breakout hit after its release. There have been plenty of theories about what this movie will be, which Beatty will be writing, directing, producing and acting in. Some say that his recent victory in court over legal rights to “Dick Tracy” may be a clue, others believe it’s a long-rumored Howard Hughes biography. Whatever it is, Paramount seems eager to hand Beatty the reigns and see what his return will produce.

Writer Gigi Gaston has been hired to write an adaptation of the novel “The Pro”. The story will stick close to the plot of the book in which a slick former golf pro and womanizer who accidentally redeems himself from his wild lifestyle. Gaston has written and sold several screenplays in recent years to big names like Drew Barrymore and Imagine Entertainment.

Andrew Niccol is almost assuredly sitting on a hit movie. Not only did he write the screenplay, an adaptation of Stephanie Meyers’ novel “The Host” but he also directed the film. With European distribution rights nabbed up faster than you could blink an eye at Cannes, all signs point to “American teenagers will fork over ticket money before you can say vampire”.  Though “The Host”, a tale about an alien invasion” doesn’t have nearly the following that “Twilight” does, the film will likely perform very well simply by association.