GregKinnear and Hope Davis will join Pierce Brosnan in the black comedy Matador, which is being financed by Bob Yari and Mark Gordon's Stratus FilmCompany and is due to go into production in Mexico City in April.

RichardShepard wrote the screenplay and will direct, with Irish DreamTime principalsBrosnan and Beau St Clair producing along with Furst Films' Sean and BryanFurst (The Cooler). Yari and Gordonwill serve as executive producers.

Matador centres on an unlikelyfriendship between a globe-trotting assassin with a taste for extremes(Brosnan) and a gullible young suburban couple from Denver (Kinnear and Davis).

"Wewere knocked out when we read this script," Yari and Gordon said in a jointstatement. "We expect this movie to have great commercial appeal throughout theworld."

"Itis rare to land your dream cast," Furst added. "The fact that it happened is atestament to the strength of this material, the tenacity of Stratus and thecollective passion behind the project."

Stratushas a first look distribution deal with Universal/Focus Features. Its projectsinclude Prime starring Sandra Bullockand Meryl Streep, The Painted Veil starringEdward Norton, Hostage, starringBruce Willis and the recently completed Crash,which stars Don Cheadle, Sandra Bullock and Matt Dillon, and Winter Passing, starring Will Ferrelland Ed Harris, which Focus will distribute.

Laws Of Attraction, the romantic comedystarring Brosnan and Julianne Moore, will be released on Apr 30 through NewLine.

FurstFilms most recently produced The Cooler,which earned an Oscar nomination for Alec Baldwin and was released last yearthrough Lions Gate, and Owning Mahoney starringPhillip Seymour Hoffman, which was released by Sony Pictures Classic.

Thecompany is currently in post-production on M Night Shyamalan's sci-fi thriller The Woods for United Artists, whichstars Joaquin Phoenix, Bryce Howard and Sigourney Weaver.