Looks like Nicole Kidman is joining Robert Pattinson in the adaptation of Guy de Maupassant’s Bel Ami, according to Production Weekly and Screen Daily.
Update 11/05 – This has been denied by Nicole Kidman’s agent according to Gossip Cop.
This will be the feature film debut as directors for Declan Donnellan and Nick Ormerod, the founders of the Cheek By Jowl theatre company. Bel Ami will be produced by Uberto Pasolini (The Full Monty). This is a pretty interesting pairing
Below is the book description (pulled from Amazon, and of the Penguin Classic Edition) :
Young, attractive and very ambitious, George Duroy, known to his friends as Bel-Ami, is offered a job as a journalist on La Vie francaise and soon makes a great success of his new career. But he also comes face to face with the realities of the corrupt society in which he lives the sleazy colleagues, the manipulative mistresses and wily financiers and swiftly learns to become an arch-seducer, blackmailer and social climber in a world where love is only a means to an end. Written when Maupassant was at the height of his powers, Bel-Ami is a novel of great frankness and cynicism, but it is also infused with the sheer joy of life depicting the scenes and characters of Paris in the belle epoque with wit, sensitivity and humanity.
Bel Ami begins filming February in London and Budapest.
A am very very excited about this. Pattinson is ideal for the role. Cant wait.