Jason Sandford
Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.
Author Marisha Pessl, who made a big splash last year with her first book, “Special Topics in Calamity Physics,” is going to have her book made into a movie. Marisha, as you’ll recall, is from Ashvegas.
The Hollywood Reporter has it here:
Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden, the duo behind critically acclaimed drama “Half Nelson,” have signed on to adapt teen novel “Special Topics in Calamity Physics” for Miramax. Scott Rudin is producing.
Fleck and Boden will write the adaptation, with Fleck attached to direct. Boden will executive produce.
The novel, written by Marisha Pessl and published in August, centers on a teenage girl who, after spending years of high school moving each semester with her eccentric teacher father, settles in a small North Carolina town for her senior year. There she becomes part of an upper-crust social set called the Bluebloods and gets caught up in the mysterious death of their favorite teacher.
Pessl worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers before writing her novel.
“Nelson,” written by Fleck and Boden and directed by Fleck, was a critics’ and awards darling and netted star Ryan Gosling an Academy Award nomination this past Oscar season. The pair are working on “Sugar,” a tale of a Dominican baseball player in the U.S. minor leagues, which is being produced by Journeyman Pictures and Hunting Lane Films, the companies behind “Nelson.” The movie is eyeing a summer start.
Sounds like she’s got a great team to take her book to the big screen. Congratulations to Marisha! Wonder if there will be any attempt to do some movie filming here in the mountains, since that’s where the book is set….
Now remember Marisha, we here at Ashvegas have tons of acting experience. Need a snarky blogger for a scene or two? Or how about a smart-ass papparazzi type? We can even play a dimwitted television anchor if you need one! Or if you just need a general Asheville consultant, don’t forget us.
Sounds like fun to me. I read the book last winter and enjoyed it very much. If they cast the movie well it should be a hit.
Interesting! Nice scoop. Can’t imagine how much they’ll have to condense this novel to make it into a film. Of course, someone should have cut 200 pages out of the book before it was published anyway.