It’s a good day to be a female author, especially if you’re Annie Ward or Lara Prescott. Each writer has received respective adaptation deals for novels that have yet to hit the shelves. Warner Bros. Pictures and producer Sue Kroll have acquired film rights to Ward’s upcoming debut thriller “Beautiful Bad.” Prescott’s “We Were Never Here” will be making its way to The Ink Factory and Marc Platt Productions.
Deadline writes that “Beautiful Bad” explores the slippery slope that comes with love, friendship, PTSD, and crime. It ultimately tells the “devastating story of three friends face to face with manipulation, turmoil, and tragedy, unable to outrun their tangled and tumultuous past.”
Kroll lauded the multifaceted nature of Ward’s work. “On the one hand, the novel carries the suspense of a truly unpredictable psychological thriller,” she said. “It kept me guessing to the very end. Alongside that intrigue, however, is also a poignant and heartbreaking love story between the closest of friends.” “Beautiful Bad” will be released in the U.S. next spring.
“Strange Habits” marked Ward’s first screenplay. The short played at Sundance and received the Grand Jury Prize at the Aspen Film Festival. She is the recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship and An Escape to Create Artists residency.
Kroll recently began her own production banner via Warner Bros. Pictures. She is an exec producer of Bradley Cooper’s highly anticipated remake of “A Star Is Born,” starring Lady Gaga. “Motherless Brooklyn,” an untitled Sandra Bullock comedy, and Nicole Kidman-starrer “The Goldfinch” are also among her current projects. She will produce Cathy Yan’s DC film “Birds of Prey,” which sees Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn at the forefront.
Also a debut thriller, Prescott’s “You Were Never Here” is a fictional love story surrounding the publication of Boris Pasternak’s “Doctor Zhivago.” It reimagines the CIA’s true attempt to implement Pasternak’s novel as a weapon of the Cold War by smuggling it into the USSR. Variety notes that, preceding its anticipated 2020 release, Prescott’s novel has already been sold in 25 countries.
The Ink Factory and Marc Platt Prods. share its screen rights. The Ink Factory is behind AMC’s “The Night Manager” and upcoming mini-series “The Little Drummer Girl,” based on John le Carré’s novel of the same name. Platt’s production credits include “La La Land,” “Bridge of Spies,” and the forthcoming live-action remakes of Disney’s “The Little Mermaid” and “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.”
Both companies are elated to work with Prescott’s material. “‘We Were Never Here’ is a remarkable novel by any standards, and as a first novel, breathtaking,” said The Ink Factory’s co-CEO Stephen Cornwell. “The greatest spy stories are also great love stories. Lara’s wonderful book delivers on all that promise and more.”
Adam Siegel, president of Marc Platt Prods. added, “At the center of Lara Prescott’s unforgettable novel is the audacious idea that a piece of art can change the world.”
No word yet on whether “You Were Never Here” will be a series or feature.
