The Wrap broke the news that Rachel is ‘being eyed’ for the female lead alongside Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton and Stanley Tucci in Thomas McCarthy’s upcoming movie “Spotlight“. Deadline is also reporting that Aaron Eckhart and Liev Schreiber joined the cast and that they are aiming to start filming this fall in Boston and Toronto. THR is reporting that Rachel and Ruffalo, Keaton, and Tucci are all in “advanced talks” to board the movie.

Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton and Stanley Tucci are all in talks to star in Tom McCarthy’s “Spotlight,” which follows the Pulitzer Prize-winning Boston Globe journalists who exposed the Catholic Church’s decades-long cover-up of child molestation in Massachusetts, multiple individuals familiar with the prestige project have told TheWrap.

Ruffalo is nearing a deal to play Michael Rezendes, while Rachel McAdams is being eyed for the female lead of Sacha Pfeiffer. McAdams has an official offer, though she has not started formal negotiations yet.

Participant Media is financing the project, which is being produced by Anonymous Content and Rocklin/Faust. Open Road has come on to handle domestic distribution.

Steve Golin and Michael Sugar of Anonymous Content are producing with Nicole Rocklin and Blye Faust. David Mizner, who brought the project to Rocklin/Faust, will consult and serve as an associate producer.

Producers have secured life rights of the Globe reporters responsible, including Spotlight Team members Rezendes, Pfeiffer and Matt Carroll, Spotlight Team editor Walter “Robby” Robinson, special projects editor Ben Bradlee Jr. and Globe editor Marty Baron.

When Baron saw an article in the Globe just after starting as editor about a Boston priest who had molested children, he realized a bigger story could lie behind it. He spurred a team of reporters to spend a year interviewing hundreds of victims and poring over thousands of documents.

The Globe team eventually discovered that Cardinal Bernard Law had hidden years of serial abuse by moving guilty priests from one parish to another, where they often abused again.

The team’s articles won them the Pulitzer Prize in 2003 for meritorious public service and set off a wave of revelations around the world.

The project was announced in April 2010 and described as being in the vein of the classic journalism movie “All the President’s Men.”

Bradlee Jr. is the son of legendary Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee, who stood behind Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein when their Watergate reporting was assailed by President Richard Nixon and his White House staff.

McAdams can currently be seen opposite Phillip Seymour Hoffman in “A Most Wanted Man,” and next year, she’ll share the screen with Bradley Cooper in Cameron Crowe’s Hawaii-set romantic comedy. She’s represented by WME and Magnolia Entertainment.

Deadline is reporting the following story which includes some additional information.

Open Road is teaming with Participant Media, eOne, and Anonymous Content on Spotlight, a drama that Tom McCarthy will direct about the Boston Globe investigation into pedophile priests and a shameful coverup in the Catholic Church that allowed the predators to prey on children for years. Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Michael Keaton, Aaron Eckhart, Liev Schreiber and Stanley Tucci will star. It’s shaping up to be a big movie, with Anonymous Content producing, Open Road releasing domestic and eOne selling international. McCarthy helmed The Visitor and scripted the animated film Up, and the script is by The West Wing‘s Josh Singer and McCarthy.

The title refers to the Spotlight Team of reporters and editors of the Boston Globe that uncovered an unimaginable city-wide conspiracy to cover-up clergy child abuse. That investigative team included then-Globe editor Marty Baron (Schreiber), Spotlight Team editor Walter “Robby” Robinson (Keaton). Reporters Michael Rezendes (Ruffalo), Sacha Pfeiffer (McAdams), and Matt Carroll spent a year interviewing victims and reviewing thousands of pages of documents and discovered years of cover-up by Catholic Church leadership. Their reporting eventually led to the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law who had hidden years of serial abuse by other priests and opened the floodgates to other revelations of molestation and cover-ups around the world which still reverberate today. For their efforts, the Globe team won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2003. Tucci will portray attorney Mitchell Garabedian, who achieved national acclaim representing the families of abuse victims. Pic will shoot in Boston and Toronto in the fall.

Participant has been working on this one for awhile, originally with DreamWorks. But that studio is no longer involved. Singer scripted another whistleblower pic, the Julian Assange pic The Fifth Estate, which DreamWorks and Participant made together. The film has come together with a killer cast; Schreiber, ironically, is doing career best work in the Showtime drama Ray Donovan, which has an undercurrent of the Boston priest scandal. Ruffalo is coming off HBO’s Emmy nominated The Normal Heart and the John Carney-directed Begin Again. It is certainly a hot potato issue, but falls into the tradition of films like All The President’s Men, where journalists took on a power structure and exposed an untenable situation and scandal.

Anonymous Content’s Steve Golin, coming off True Detective and Michael Sugar and Rocklin/Faust’s Nicole Rocklin and Blye Faust will produce. David Mizner will serve as a consultant and associate producer. Participant Media’s Jonathan King and Jeff Skoll are exec producers. Open Road Films’ Tom Ortenberg and Peter Lawson will also be executive producers.

eOne Films International will handle international sales of the film in all territories outside of the UK, Canada, Spain, Benelux and Australia/New Zealand, where the company will distribute directly. Open Road Films will distribute Spotlight in the U.S., where a wide release is planned. Deals were brokered by Harold van Lier for eOne with Jeff Ivers and Jonathan King for Participant Media, and Tom Ortenberg, Elliott Kleinberg and Peter Lawson for Open Road.