George Clooney does it all in the upcoming ‘Monuments Men’

As if George Clooney isn’t busy enough being cooler and more handsome than 95% of the guys on the planet, he’s put himself back on triple duty for his next project, in which he’ll serve as writer, director, and leading man.

Clooney is currently in Germany, where shooting has commenced on “The Monuments Men,” a drama set during World War II. Based on a true story, “The Monuments Men” concerns a band of American and British art experts who teamed with the American military to rescue a cache of rare and valuable masterpieces that had been seized by Nazi troops, some of which were soon to be destroyed because of their “degenerate” (read: Jewish) creators.

As is often the case with Clooney’s projects, he’ll have some A-list friends helping him out. In addition to Clooney, the cast includes Matt Damon, Cate Blanchett, Daniel Craig, Bill Murray, John Goodman, and Jean Dujardin (the latter landing one of his first major English-language roles after winning a Best Actor Oscar for “The Artist”). Clooney co-wrote the screenplay with Grant Heslov, who was also his writing partner on “Good Night and Good Luck” and “The Idea Of March.” (The script was based on the book of the same name by Robert M. Edsel and Bret Witter.) And just in case Clooney somehow gets bored, the writer-director-star will also be co-producing the picture with Heslov through their Smoke House Productions imprint.

Columbia Pictures and 20th Century Fox are financing the project in association with the German production house Studio Babelsberg.

Clooney and his pals will be filming in Europe and the UK through June, and the film is currently slated to open in the United States in December, giving it a shot at the 2014 Academy Awards if all goes according to schedule.