March 4, 2003
Hollywood witch project
By LOUIS B. HOBSON
HOLLYWOOD -- Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman may soon find themselves embroiled in a battle of witches.

Kidman has been signed to star in the big-screen version of the 1960s TV series Bewitched as Samantha, a witch who marries a mortal and is thwarted in her attempt to give up her powers and become an ordinary housewife.

Nora Ephron, whose screenplays include When Harry Met Sally, Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail, is working on the adaptation.

Before their divorce, Cruise and Kidman were planning to star together in a remake of I Married a Witch, a 1942 comedy that inspired Bewitched and featured Fredric March and Veronica Lake as a mortal and the witch he marries.

Both Bewitched and I Married a Witch, to be directed by Danny DeVito, are being prepped for a 2004 release.

Kidman is negotiating to star opposite Brad Pitt in the action comedy Mr. and Mrs. Smith, about a bored married couple who discover they're actually enemy agents that have been assigned to assassinate each other.