The Gwynaissance continues.
After roughly a decade away from Hollywood, Gwyneth Paltrow has found another plum film role in the movie adaptation of Belle Burden’s hit book “Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage.”
Netflix took the rights to the memoir this week in a heated six-way auction, sources tell Variety. UTA brokered the deal for Burden, whose New York Times bestseller captivated the country this year with a devastating and candid look at the dissolution of a marriage.
Paltrow, just off an award-season push for her dramatic big screen comeback in “Marty Supreme,” is an obvious fit for the material. The Oscar winner’s company Goop was responsible for introducing “conscious uncoupling” into the culture in 2014, sparking wide-ranging conversations about bitterness, forgiveness and divorce.
Super-producer Stacey Sher is on board to handle the project, with acclaimed screenwriter Heidi Schreck set to adapt the script. Paltrow will star and executive produce.
Burden is an immigration attorney and the granddaughter of society matriarch Babe Paley. Her memoir kicks off six years ago, when Burden sat “safe and secure with her family at their house on Martha’s Vineyard, navigating the early days of the pandemic together — building fires in the late afternoons, drinking whisky sours, making roast chicken. Then, with no warning or explanation, her husband of 20 years announced that he was leaving her. Overnight, her caring, steady partner became a man she hardly recognized.” The larger work, per publisher The Dial Press, “revisits her marriage, searching for clues that her husband was not who she always thought he was. As she examines her relationship through a new lens, she reckons with her own family history and the lessons she intuited about how a woman is expected to behave in the face of betrayal.”
Paltrow was last seen in Josh Safdie’s “Marty Supreme,” returning to prestige indies after 12 years. The film collected nine Oscar nominations and marks distributor A24’s highest-grossing title to date. Paltrow collected an Oscar for “Shakespeare in Love,” and has been decorated with Golden Globe and Emmy awards. In addition to moonlighting in the Marvel universe, Paltrow has largely devoted her time to her category-defining lifestyle business.
Schreck is a playwright and screenwriter based in Brooklyn. Her critically acclaimed play “What the Constitution Means to Me” played a sold-out run on Broadway, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and nominated for two Tonys. Schreck’s other plays include “Grand Concourse,” “Creature” and a new translation of “Uncle Vanya,” which recently premiered at Lincoln Center starring Steve Carell. She is currently writing a screenplay with Sarah Polley for Warner Bros. and developing a live-action “She-Ra” series for Prime Video.
Sher has produced over two dozen features earning nearly $2.7 billion at the worldwide box office. Her many credits include Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction,” “Django Unchained” and “The Hateful Eight”; Steven Soderbergh’s “Erin Brockovich,” “Out of Sight” and “Contagion”; “Garden State” and “Get Shorty.” Most recently, Sher produced the A24 thriller “Heretic,” which earned star Hugh Grant BAFTA, Critics Choice and Golden Globe award nominations. She’ll next release “Verity,” the Coleen Hoover adaptation starring Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett.
Burden is repped by Brettne Bloom at The Book Group and UTA. Schreck is represented by Curate Management and UTA. Paltrow is with Lighthouse Management & Media.
English (US) ·