Gary Ross Interested In Directing Matt Helm?

I'm still smarting over Steven Spielberg's decision to pass on directing the new Matt Helm film in favor of an invisible rabbit. Ah, what might have been! Now, Aintitcool tips a story on The Playlist reporting that another director is circling the project: Gary Ross. That's right, the Seabiscuit guy. Ross recently contributed to the script for Spider-man 4 and just signed on to write and possibly direct Venom, a Spider-man spinoff for Sony. According to The Playlist, however, "Venom is a ways off and will have to wait; Matt Helm is coming first and is being scheduled to shoot in the summer of 2010 if all goes according to plan." The site goes on to reveal that Madmen's Jon Hamm was at one point considered for the titular role (if it was a period piece, that would have been incredible, but it's supposedly a contemporary, dare I say it, Bourne-ish take on Helm), but Bradley Cooper is now the frontrunner. Cooper's got spy cred from his Alias days, but I can't quite picture him as Helm. Whoever ends up in the lead, though, I'm very excited that that project has so much momentum. I keep hearing wonderful things about Paul Attanasio's script, and it's high time Helm were done right for the screen!