The hot streak continues for “Appropriate Behavior” writer-director-star Desiree Akhavan. Deadline reports that she’s been tapped to helm “Adam,” an adaptation of Ariel Schrag’s 2012 coming-of-age novel of the same name, for Symbolic Exchange. The news comes less than two weeks after the announcement that Akhavan will direct and co-write “The Miseducation of Cameron Post,” another coming-of-age film that’s also based on a novel. Chloe Grace Moretz and “American Honey” breakout Sasha Lane will star in the LGBTQ indie drama. No word on who will star in “Adam” just yet.
“Adam” is set in 2006 Brooklyn and “tells the story of an awkward teenager who goes to spend his final summer of high school with his older sister, who has thrown herself into New York City’s lesbian and trans activist scene,” Deadline writes. “Adam meets the girl of his dreams at a party; but there’s one wrinkle — he can’t quite figure out how to tell her he’s not the trans man she thinks he is.”
Schrag adapted her book for the big screen. Production is expected to kick off in late spring of next year.
Akhavan made her feature debut with 2014’s “Appropriate Behavior,” a semi-autobiographical comedy about a bisexual Brooklyn-based woman struggling with a break up. Matters are further complicated by the fact that she hasn’t come out to her Iranian family, who believed that her ex was merely her roommate. Akhavan was nominated for a 2015 Indie Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay for the film.
In an interview with Women and Hollywood, Akhavan said that she hoped audiences who saw “Appropriate Behavior” would leave the theater “relating to a character who may seem very distant from themselves. I wanted to make a film which happened to be about a gay Iranian, but didn’t feel like taking your medicine,” she explained. Akhavan joked, “It’s like when a US magazine does the ‘Stars, They’re Just Like Us!’ thing, only we’re saying, ‘The
Marginalized! We’re Just Like You!’”
When we asked Akhavan her advice for women directors, she offered a succinct answer: “Don’t wait for someone to enable you to make something.” She also observed that female filmmakers are “pretty well represented when it comes to first features on the festival circuit. It’s when it comes to second and third films that we see a drop off.”
It’s great to see that Akhavan has her second and third feature lined up. It’s also important to note that “Adam,” “The Miseducation of Cameron Post,” and “Appropriate Behavior” all center on LGBTQ characters. Of the 4,370 named, speaking characters from the top-grossing films in 2015, less than one percent were LGBT-identified.
