Carrie Brownstein to Pen ‘Lost in Austen’ Film Adaptation
Carrie Brownstein currently helps flesh out the modern hipsters and weirdos of the Pacific Northwest on the IFC comedy Portlandia. But her newest writing project looks to the past: As Variety reports, Brownstein has signed on to write a film adaptation of the U.K. series Lost in Austen, which finds a modern day Brooklynite transported to the world (19th century England) of Jane Austen’s 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice.
Lost in Austen will be Brownstein’s first film writing credit; it was one of screenwriter Nora Ephron’s unfinished projects at the time of her 2012 death. The film will be produced by Columbia Pictures, Sam Mendes and Pippa Harris (of Neal Street Productions) and Nathan Kahane (of Good Universe); executive produced by Nicolas Brown (Neal Street), John Middleton, Roy Lee and Joe Drake; and overseen by Good Universe’s Erin Westerman.
Between her various film and TV projects, Brownstein is staying busy. She’s also been working on a memoir, tentatively due out next year.
“It’s difficult,” she told Rolling Stone of writing the book earlier this year. “I feel too young to do this, but I can’t imagine waiting 30 years and trying to remember it all.” The book focuses partially on Brownstein’s time in her former band Sleater-Kinney, and she’s interviewed family members and former bandmates to help corroborate her own memories. Throughout the process, she’s come to blame herself for tensions that led to the group’s indefinite hiatus in 2006.
“I feel a lot more culpable than I ever thought I would,” she said. “My anxiety was getting bigger than the band. For (bandmate) Corin (Tucker), it was kind of like, ‘Well, this isn’t fun anymore, because we have this crazy person in the band.’ Meaning me.”