Vintage Face-Off



Imagine Seabiscuit with Chardonnays instead of racehorses, and you essentially have the plot of George M. Taber's Judgment of Paris (Scribner, 2005). Just optioned for film by producers Clark Peterson (Monster) and Elizabeth Fowler, the title recounts a 1976 blind tasting organized by the Paris-based wine merchant Steven Spurrier, a Brit, in which the Americans routed their Gallic neighbors. The film is representative of the vogue for vineyard-set movies (see: Russell Crowe as a businessman-turned-grape-picker in November's A Good Year), following the success of Alexander Payne's adaptation of Rex Pickett's Sideways (St. Martin's/Griffin, 2004). The deal was negotiated by the Intellectual Property Group's Maria Ruvalcaba Hackett on behalf of Harvey Klinger Inc., which reps Taber for lit.

Guerilla Wars

Steven Soderbergh's 2007 Che Guevara biopic, starring Benicio Del Toro and scheduled to be shot following production on Ocean's 13, may be receiving some competition. According to Navy Seal—turned—author/screenwriter Chuck Pfarrer (The Jackel), his debut novel about the Argentinean revolutionary—at one point known as Under Other Skies—has also generated "a couple of serious nibbles in Hollywood, and a couple large fish." Pfarrer's book, which focuses on a fictional CIA paramilitary operator's attempt to crush a Che-led insurgency in 1967 Bolivia, is due from Random House next spring. Julia Lord of Julia Lord Literary reps Pfarrer for lit.

Briefs...

Walter Mosley creations Easy Rawlins and Mouse are getting a new lease on life courtesy of HBO Films. The production company has just acquired film rights to Mosley's Little Scarlet, and Jeffrey Wright and Mos Def have signed on to take over the roles originated by Denzel Washington and Don Cheadle in the 1995 adaptation of Mosley's Devil in a Blue Dress. Mosley—who, in his original Devil deal with Tristar, retained the rights to his books' characters—is also writing the script.... Oscar-winners William Hurt and Marcia Gay Harden have signed on to play the parents of tragic runaway Chris McCandless (Emile Hirsch) in Into the Wild, director Sean Penn's take on Jon Krakauer's 1998 nonfiction book (Hollywood Reader, Mar. 20).

Correction: In "Power of Three" (May 22), Dirty Rice is the company of independent producer Anne Chaisson.

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