Toni Collette Lucky ThemOliver Platt, 90210‘s Ryan Eggold and The Help‘s Ahna O’Reilly have joined Toni Collette in Lucky Them, the film that Paul Newman was working on when he passed away in 2008. The “un-romantic comedy” about a female rock journalist on assignment to hunt down her musician ex-boyfriend began filming in Seattle last weekend on Newman’s birthday — January 26th. Newman’s wife Joanne Woodward signed on to executive produce the picture last year to help its cause. Thomas Haden Church plays the elusive ex, with Platt, Eggold and O’Reilly rounding out the supporting cast.

Paul Newman Lucky ThemNewman had hoped to cameo in the film and gave notes on the project, inspiring Woodward to get involved. The semi-autobiographical script is by Emily Wachtel and Huck Botko; Woodward, Wachtel, and Amy Hobby (who previously produced Sam Shepard’s doc Shepard & Dark) are producing alongside Adam Gibbs with Peer Pedersen executive producing. Megan Griffiths is directing. The project previously had Marisa Tomei, Alec Baldwin, and Allison Janney attached.

Emmy-winner Collette (The United States Of Tara) is set to return to TV in CBS’s Jerry Bruckheimer-produced drama Hostages. On the big screen she most recently co-starred in Hitchcock and appears in Nat Faxon and Jim Rash’s crowd-pleaser The Way, Way Back, which Fox Searchlight snapped up for $10 million at Sundance. Later this year Collette is set to make her directorial debut in the omnibus pic Sydney Unplugged. She also stars in Nicole Holofcener’s untitled next film and Pascal Chaumeil’s A Long Way Down, adapted from the Nick Hornby novel. Collette is repped by WME and Jackoway Tyerman Wertheimer Austen Mandelbaum Morris & Klein.

Meanwhile, rising indie helmer Griffiths (The Off Hours) comes off the award-winning human trafficking drama Eden and co-produced Lynn Shelton’s 2011 pic Your Sister’s Sister. She is repped by WME and Caliber Media Company. Eggold is repped by Gersh, while Platt and O’Reilly are with WME.