Zhang Ziyi to star in book club hit 'Snow Flower and the Secret Fan'

By Sarah Sluis

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan is a novel about a secret language, nu shu, used by women in China. Often written on fans, the language provided a rare opportunity for women to interact with each other in 19th-century China, since the women's feet were bound, they remained cloistered in their homes, and were subject to their husband and sons. Written by Chinese-American writer Lisa See, the novel follows two such women who were chosen as laotong (old sames) by a matchmaker, a rare form of friendship that requires being born on the same day, in the same birth order, and having other complementary characteristics.

The novel's historic setting and theme of friendship made it a big hit on the book club circuit. So perhaps it's no surprise that two middle-aged wives, the book club stereotype, are producing a film based on the book, though they bring some unusually high-powered connections to the table. The producers behind it? Wendi Murdoch, wife of Rupert Murdoch (the president and CEO of Newscorp.), and Florence Sloan, wife of Harry Sloan (the chairman of MGM). They just added actress Zhang Ziyi to their list of producers. The star of Memoirs of a Geisha, another book club hit, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has a rare appeal that extends across cultural boundaries. Her role in production could also help the film get past China's film quota, which limits the amount of foreign films that are exhibited each year. Wendi Murdoch is Chinese-born, and Florence Sloan is Malaysian and Chinese. For a cross-cultural, Chinese-based production like this, their cultural fluency will be a prized asset.

The project is in search of a distributors and backers at the American Film Market, though the production has already set a start date for next year. While the project is commercial and has a global audience, it's worth noting that so far it is being produced outside the studio system. Certainly those currently on the project are uniquely suited to the task, but was Memoirs of a Geisha's $162 million gross on an $85 million budget just not good enough for the big studios? Or did the producers of the project snag the rights before anyone else?