Steve Carell to teach dogs to speak

Earlier in the week we wondered if Steve Carell‘s post-Office career would afford him an opportunity to show off his range and save him from typecasting-hell. Well, this shut us right up!

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Carell will produce and star in an adaptation of Carolyn Parkhurst’s not-so-comedic novel Dogs of Babel.

Carell will star as a linguistics professor who returns home one day to discover his wife has died in their backyard. Although the death is ruled an accident by police, the suspicious professor reaches out to the only witness – his dog – and tries to teach it to speak, and hopefully explain what happened.

No director is yet attached, but Mandate Pictures is looking to sign one up tout de’suite. It is unknown whether this news will affect Carell’s tentative involvement in the comedy Great Hope Springs.

Discuss: Does Carell have the chops to carry a drama about grief? Or could he pull a Jim Carrey and become a genuine Oscar contender?