I’ve witnessed tales of scripts making it up the ladder in more obscure ways, but if this does get a greenlight you’ll be sure that this will be mentioned in the press notes. The Hollywood Reports reports that Jason Lew’s first screenplay made it into the hands of the great Gus Van Sant via actress Bryce Dallas Howard. If Van Sant is looking on making this studio project his next, then what does this tell us about the status of The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and How Starbucks Saved My Life?
Here is how Restless landed in the Van Sant camp. The 15-million dollar project would be set up in Oregon.
The Lew-Howard connection: “Lew and Bryce Howard attended New York University together and it was there that Lew first wrote the story as a play. Howard, who had acted in plays with Lew, got a peek at the story and encouraged him to write it as a screenplay.”
Howard-Howard: “After several drafts and a “gestation period,” Bryce Howard brought it to her father Ron who, taken with Lew’s perspective and originality, wanted to further develop it for Imagine. Lew kept on working on the screenplay with Imagine execs, who ultimately showed it to Van Sant.”
Howard-Brian Grazer: No need to mention it, but the two have been working together for decades now.
The Grazer-Van Sant connection: In case you might have purposefully forgotten, Grazer was the producer behind Van Sant’s ballsy remaking of Hitchcock’s Psycho. Apparently, Grazer has wanted to produce with the filmmaker ever since.
