During an on-stage interview at Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade theatre last December, Alan Arkin said the job he wants more than anything else is to be in a big-studio franchise movie, the kind of film in which he’d have to gesture wildly in front of a green screen and go, “Look out, the thing is coming!”

I don’t know if Arkin’s winning of the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Little Miss Sunshine had anything to do with this, but his agent has gotten him what he wants — the role of CONTROL in a big-screen version of Get Smart with Steve Carell in the Don Adams/”Maxwell Smart” role. It’ll be crude and common, of course (Adam Sandler protege Peter Segal is directing), and Arkin — who knows the difference between smart, sophisticated comedy and coarse, low-rent crap — will be delighted with the paycheck, especially if they make two or three. But inwardly he’ll be mortified.