Atonement star McAvoy stepped down before filming of I’m With Cancer began so he wouldn’t miss the birth of his first child.

Actors James McAvoy and Ann-Marie Duff are expecting their baby in a few weeks. James insists he doesn’t want to miss the big moment.

The Scot was signed up to a £1million part in a movie called I’m With Cancer, but pulled out a week or so ago.

Shooting on the film begins in Canada this week. He has been replaced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

A friend of the pair told the Daily Telegraph: “ James wants to be there when his baby’s born.”

Ann-Marie, 39 and James, 30 met on the set of Shameless in 2003 and married three years later.

Ann-Marie recently played John Lennon’s mother in the film Nowhere Boy.

Producer of I’m With Cancer, Seth Rogen said: “It’s incredibly unfortunate that circumstances outside of everyone’s control have taken James away from the project. We all look forward to working with James in the future.”

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Seth Rogen is hardly the image that comes to mind when you mention the words “Winter Olympics,” but he and his crew will be hitting Vancouver during the games in a quest for movie-making gold.

Rogen will produce and star in “I’m With Cancer” in his native stomping grounds at just about the same time the world will be descending on his fair city to do things like watch figure skating and curling.

The mad logistics of this plan are not lost on one of the “I’m with Cancer” stars. “We’re going to be the only movie filming in Vancouver during the Olympics,” James McAvoy lamented during a press day for “The Last Station.” “There is a reason no one else is filming during the Olympics.”

The Scottish star added that there were “fabulous” aspects to the idea and said he planned to take full advantage of the shoot to catch some events. Not that the Scots are a particular powerhouse in the winter games, but you get the idea.

The reasons for the movie location are biographical rather than any Olympic subplots (so there is hope we will never have to see Rogen in one of those form-fitting speedskating outfits). The story deals with Rogen’s Vancouver life and friend Will Reiser’s battle with cancer in his mid-20s.

McAvoy will play Reiser, who wrote the screenplay and is executive producing. Rogen plays himself in the movie and Anna Kendrick plays a young, inexperienced psychologist assigned to help McAvoy’s character.

“You wouldn’t call it comedy,” says McAvoy. “But there are bits of it that are funny. Because Seth’s in it, everyone calls it a comedy.”

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James McAvoy has denied rumours that he will play James Bond author Ian Fleming in a movie.

The Scottish star, who is currently filming Gnomeo and Juilet, said that he finds it “weird” that people make up rumours about actors and film roles.

“I’m not attached to any Ian Fleming film. I have no idea how that rumour got started. Somebody put it on the internet or said it to a journalist,” Collider quotes him as saying.

“It’s weird how people will just confirm stuff without actually asking me. It’s not that I think it’s a bad script. I’ve read it and I thought it was a really good script, but I just haven’t spoken to those producers and I haven’t attached myself to it.”

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