Charlize Theron is developing a film version of Christopher Buckley's Florence of Arabia, a comic satire about the Middle East. That may sound like a contradiction in terms, and certainly we suspect that this one could be controversial, but it does have potential.
The story concerns Florence Farfaletti, Deputy to the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Near East Affairs in the US State Department. A friend of hers who is married to an Arabian prince (of the fiction state of Wasabia) is executed on flimsy, sexist charges, and Florence conceives a plan to tackle women's rights in the Middle East - or at least the fictional Wasabia.
Based in the neighbouring, and more liberal, state of Matar, she and a crack team that includes a hit man, a PR guy and a gay Foreign Service officer try to shake things up via the medium of television.
Theron is developing the project with plans to star in it, with Death At A Funeral's Dean Craig writing the script.