BBC Films reteams with Iannucci for voyeurism film

BBC Films and In The Loop director Armando Iannucci are to team up again on a new $20m (£13.8m) London-based project Out The Window, scripted by Iannucci with Will Smith and Roger Drew.

Hingeing on voyeurism, the film is about an incident that is witnessed but deeply misinterpreted, setting off a series of events that spiral out of control. BBC Films’ creative director Christine Langan said that there will be “significant US casting” on the film. A US partner is expected to board the project soon.

Langan also confirmed that David Linde’s new company Lava Bear is partnering with BBC Films on Peter Morgan’s new project £6 million Three Sixty; a multi-stranded tale of love and sexual obsession inspired by Arthur Schnitzler’s 1900 play, La Ronde.

Meanwhile, Harvey Weinstein is in final negotiations for The Weinstein Company to come on board My Week With Marilyn. Michelle Williams is set to star as Marilyn Monroe in the film, written by Adrian Hodges, directed by Simon Curtis and produced by David Parfitt. “[Weinstein] really gets it. His excitement has been very encouraging,” Langan said.

The film is billed as a compassionate comedy about Colin Clark’s secret week with the most famous woman on earth, Marilyn Monroe, in 1956. She was in London filming The Prince And The Showgirl with Laurence Olivier.

The BBC is also working on an adaptation of Claire Tomalin’s award-winning biography of Nelly Tenan, a young actress who has an affair with Charles Dickens. The Invisible Woman has been scripted by Abi Morgan and is being produced by Stewart Mackinnon at Headline Pictures.

Titles in pre-production include “classic” ghost story The Awakening, starring Rebecca Hall, Imelda Staunton and Dominic West.  Stephen Volk has written the screenplay with Nick Murphy, who also directs. David Thompson is producing.  Studio Canal is handling international sales.

The UK broadcast is also developing Quartet, Dustin Hoffman’s directorial debut, starring Dame Maggie Smith, Albert Finney and Tom Courtenay. It is being sold by HanWay Film. Ronald Harwood has just delivered what Langan described a “strong new draft” of the screenplay.

Stephen Fry is writing a new draft of Hallelujah!, a recreation of the build up to the first performance of Handel’s Messiah, the most famous choral work ever created. It will be produced by Gina Carter with Fry directing.

Langan confirmed that former British middle distance runners Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett have “pretty much” given their blessing to Ovett And Coe, the new film about their rivalry that will be ready for the 2012 London Olympics.