Kathy Bates on "Blind Side" team

LOS ANGELES - Kathy Bates has joined Sandra Bullock in "The Blind Side," a football comedy-drama based on the best-selling novel by Michael Lewis.

The project tells the true story of football player Michael Oher, projected to be one of the first players selected in this year's NFL draft.

Bates will play a no-nonsense tutor Bullock hires to help raise Oher, a homeless black teen taken in by Bullock's well-to-do white family. The veteran actress most recently appeared in "Revolutionary Road."

The new film, based on Lewis' book "The Blind Side: Evolution of the Game," marks the first project for director John Lee Hancock since 2004's "The Alamo." FedEx founder Fred Smith's Warner Bros.-based Alcon Entertainment is financing.