Nora Ephron set to adapt 'Lost in Austen'

By Sarah Sluis

The works of Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, and other late 19th-century British novelists have been remade countless times. An adaptation of Jane Eyre opened just this year. In the literary world, the Austen impulse has gone toward genre mashups like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. The former is currently in feature development.

For those that prefer their period romance unadulterated, the 2008 British miniseries "Lost in Austen" provided a lighter reimagining of the genre. The story centered on a modern-day woman who accidentally is transported into the plot of Pride & Prejudice, becoming Elizabeth Bennet. She finds herself falling for Mr. Darcy before she's intended to, despite her best efforts to stick to the plot. Nora Ephron has decided to write and direct a film version of the series, substituting her native New York City for the original modern London locale.

Ephron's last directorial effort, the 2008 film Julie & Julia had a similar interplay between life and fiction. The Julie in the title cooks her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, with the movie following the stories of both characters. Ephron seems like a good fit for a riff on one of the most enduring classic romantic books. Interestingly Sam Mendes (director of Revolutionary Road and the upcoming Bond 23) is making one of his first producing-only credit appearances, producing with his Neal Street Productions partner Pippa Harris, who produced Road for Mendes. Ephron's last project, a biopic of Peggy Lee starring Reese Witherspoon, still appears to be stuck in development, so hopefully production will move quicker on Lost in Austen since the script framework is already in place.