Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s next screen project will take on Rabbi Mendel Epstein and the radical methods he employed to help ultra-orthodox Jewish women seeking divorces. The “Fleishman Is in Trouble” author is set to write “The Get,” a film adaptation of Matthew Shaer’s GQ article “The Orthodox Hit Squad” for Sister, Stacey Snider, Elisabeth Murdoch, and Jane Featherstone’s content company. Deadline confirmed the news.
“The Get” explores “how communities take care of each other in the name of what’s right, and how ‘right’ can be a moving target,” the source describes. “In New York and New Jersey’s ultra-orthodox communities, one notorious rabbi, Mendel Epstein, was sought for help in managing the worst divorce cases, where husbands exploited Jewish law to deny their wives freedom from miserable marriages. This help included beatings, open graves, and cattle prods to the testicles, and it worked, but it also showed how a noble goal can sometimes only be accomplished by the most unconscionable of methods,” Deadline notes. “‘The Get’ asks whether those means are bad when the ends are so absolutely good.”
Sister’s Carolyn Strauss (“Game of Thrones”) and Kate Fenske (“Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce”) will produce the film, as will Shaer.
“I’m only a little embarrassed to say that when I first read Matt’s story in 2014 in an actual paper issue of GQ, I was extremely jealous not just of what a great and definitive feature it is on Mendel Epstein and his gang of get-getters, but of how, like all petty journalists, I was sad I hadn’t gotten the story myself,” Brodesser-Akner joked. “The subject matter is incredibly close to my heart. My family is ultra-Orthodox, and I’ve seen women close to me whose lives and plans have been derailed by the arcane and dangerous law that men possess the singular power to end a marriage, a state of affairs that tests some of their most abusive tendencies. But I couldn’t begrudge Matt the story — his is the rare one story on this subject that actually gets the world of it right, and treats the Jewish community with respect, despite its flaws.”
Brodesser-Akner added, “I never dreamed that all these years later, a killer team of executives and producers like Stacey Snider, Kate Fenske, and Carolyn Strauss (who is the common denominator in my favorite shows of the last 15 years) would give me the opportunity to advance Matt’s story — a religious mafia saga at its heart — to the screen.”
“Matt and Taffy share similar qualities that make them both standout journalists and compelling storytellers,” Snider said. “They bring scrupulous attention to the details of their stories and empathy to the characters whose lives they chronicle. With Carolyn and Kate at their side to produce, these filmmakers will bring truth and humanity to this compelling and unpredictable story.”
Brodesser-Akner is writing and executive producing a limited series adaptation of “Fleishman Is in Trouble,” her bestselling debut novel, for FX. The project follows recently-divorced Toby as he adjusts to his new life of split custody and the dating scene. One day, his wife disappears seemingly out of thin air, a turn of events that forces Toby to reexamine his failed, 15-year-long marriage.
Brodesser-Akner’s next book, “Long Island Compromise,” will hit shelves next year. She is also a staff writer at New York Times Magazine, and has written for GQ and ESPN the Magazine. Brodesser-Akner has received the New York Press Club Award and the Mirror Award for her celebrity profiles.
