One of the hits of 2005’s Edinburgh Festival was David Harrower’s play Blackbird. Following its move to the West End and subsequent Olivier Award for Best New Work, it’s now being adapted for the screen. Rooney Mara and Ben Mendelsohn have signed on to play the couple awkwardly reunited 15 years after a dubious affair. Benedict Andrews, who recently directed Gillian Anderson and Ben Foster on stage to storming effect in A Streetcar Named Desire, will make his debut behind the camera.
Mara will play Una, a woman in her 20s who had a torrid affair with Mendelsohn’s office worker Ray when she was just 12 and he was in his late 30s. Ray went to jail because of it and has since started a new life under a new identity. But Una has tracked him down, and the drama of their sudden reunion is infused with tension as her real agenda. Does she want closure and apologies, or is she actually more in the market for revenge?
On stage Blackbird is a single 90-minute act between two performers, so it’ll be interesting to see how the work will be expanded for the cinema. Will new characters be added, or will it remain essentially a two-hander, like Sleuth or Hard Candy?
Jean Doumanian and Patrick Daly (August: Osage County) will produce, and shooting is scheduled for next summer.