An example of great casting? Swank to play ‘Amelia’

With Shantaram on hold, Mira Nair’s take on Amelia Earhart is definitely taking flight – Variety reports that Hilary Swank and her femine/masculin chiseled features will fit just perfectly with what the records show as a gutsy female pilot. 

Amelia is currently not attached to any studio (expect a sale probably while filming). The project tells her story in the formative stages of her career. George Putnam, a publisher and publicist, was engaged by society denizen Amy Guest to set up a daring nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. When Guest was talked out of trying to become the first woman to make the trip, she dispatched Putnam to find a female pilot, and to turn the flight into a media event.

Production begins this April and the project is financed by Ted Waitt – he will produce alongside Kevin Hyman and Lydia Dean Pilcher; the latter is Nair’s producing partner. Swank and Bass will be exec producers.

Nair is currently filming her portion of New York, je t’aime – a short film collective that should be released sometime this year.