Variety has announced that Graham King’s Initial Entertainment Group has bought the film rights to THE AFFECTED PROVINCIAL’S COMPANION for Johnny Depp’s production company, Infinitum Nihil. THE AFFECTED PROVINCIAL’S COMPANION is “a compendium of essays, diagrams and poetry written, designed and illustrated by Lord Breaulove Swells Whimsy as a treatise on the value of being a refined gentleman in today’s unrefined world,” notes Variety. The delighted author posted the following comment on Amazon.com after the purchase was announced: “I can finally announce what I have known for well over a year: Infinitum Nihil, Johnny Depp’s production company, has bought the option rights to THE AFFECTED PROVINCIAL’S COMPANION, VOL. 1. I’d like to offer my sincerest thanks to my friends at Regal Literary, United Talent Agency, Infinitum Nihil, Initial Entertainment Group, and Warner Bros. Most of all, I thank the public for going to see PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN–I can assure you the proceeds have been well spent.”
In other book news, Initial and Infinitum Nihil have also purchased rights to film James Meek’s THE PEOPLE’S ACT OF LOVE, which is set in 1919 Siberia. ONBC will be reading THE PEOPLE’S ACT OF LOVE as its first selection for 2007. The story revolves around an escapee from a Russian prison camp who stumbles upon a Christian sect.
According to Variety, Initial Entertainment Group and Infinitum Nihil are negotiating with director Peter Medak (ROMEO IS BLEEDING) to film Joseph Gangemi’s screenplay of his novel INAMORATA. Set in Philadelphia in the 1920s, book revolves around a Harvard grad student who falls in love with a beautiful psychic whom he is attempting to discredit as a fraud.
Warner Bros. and Initial Entertainment Group have hired screenwriter D.V. DeVincentis to adapt A LONG WAY DOWN by Nick Hornby for Infinitum Nihil. Hornby’s novel follows four desperate people who meet on New Year’s Eve and form a surrogate family. DeVincentis is no stranger to Hornby’s work, having written the film adaptation of Hornby’s HIGH FIDELITY. “I love adapting Nick’s writing [. . . . T]here is a vibrancy in the voice that you can see working in the screen,” DeVincentis told Variety. The Zone thanks Theresa for posting the Variety article on the News & Views forum; you can read the full article HERE.