Island Pictures, the new London-based film and TV production company set up by Sarah Beardsall and Dominic Minghella, will partner with director Kirk Jones on Are We Nearly There Yet?.

Adapted from Ben Hatch’s travelogue, the comedy is about a road trip around Britain. Beardsall is billing the project as Kirk Jones’ return to his “Waking Ned Devine roots”.

Minghella is also writing the script for Doria, a new drama about composer Giacomo Puccini. The film looks at the relationship between the composer and the maid who came to work for him shortly after he had completed La Boheme and while he was working on Madame Butterfly.

“He (Puccini) was bed-ridden after a terrible accident… It’s about the unblocking (of his creativity) and the relationship (with the maid) which everybody thinks is one thing but in fact is something else,” Beardsall explained.

Minghella, brother of the late Anthony Minghella, will make his directorial debut with the film.

Another project being readied by Island Pictures is romantic comedy Status Update, which is being written by Australian comic and writer Tania Lacey.

The story follows a fortysomething woman stuck in a rut in Australia who claims falsely that she has an exciting new job in London. The cast and director should be attached shortly.

Island’s first feature, Daphne Du Maurier adaptation The Scapegoat, screened in Dinard last. Already shown on ITV1 in the UK, the film (directed by Charles Sturridge) is being sold internationally by Content.

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