With Variety‘s Michael Fleming having reported that the wise and perceptive Tom Hanks has decided against playing Elwood P. Dowd in Steven Spielberg‘s Harvey remake, Movieline‘s Kyle Buchanan is predicting that Will Smith will probably snap it up.

But if Smith knows what’s good for him, he won’t. He needs to (a) man up and stop trying to be likable/charming/ingratiating all the time, (b) never commit on-screen suicide with lethal jellyfish ever again, and (c) realize that Spielberg is starting to be over and do the old downhill side. I’m pledging right now that if Smith turns Spielberg down he’ll get a 12-month goodwill pass from Hollywood Elsewhere. Okay, 18 months.

The word needs to go out to all the agencies — turn Spielberg down if he comes calling with the Harvey role! The ideal thing would be Spielberg re-experiencing what George McGovern went through in ’72 when he offered the vice-presidential slot to just about everyone after Thomas Eagleton was zotzed off the ticket. Can the Harvey project be nipped in the bud? It’s won’t be a catastrophe if it gets made. I’ll live, nobody will get sick, etc. But it does seem like such a rotten idea.