"East of Eden" May Be A 2-Parter Says Ross

Hunger Games director Gary Ross told THR that his film adaptation of East of Eden has a good chance of being split into two films.

Based upon author John Steinbeck's classic novel about two brothers who compete for the attention of their farmer father in California around the time of World War I.

Jennifer Lawrence would play Cathy Ames, the boys’ estranged mother.

Brian Grazer is producing the film.

Due to the size and scope of the mulch-generational story, a two film adaptation had been proposed with the first part focused on the parents and the second on the two sons when they become adults.

Ross: “It may be two films. We may break it in half, into one generation and the next. And that’s what we’re talking about now."

Ross spoke to students attending the Loyola Marymount University School of Film and Television in the continuing interview series The Masters last night.

There is no start date yet set. Just when the project goes into production will depend on Jen's busy schedule and whether Ross wants to make "Eden" his next film (his first since The Hunger Games).

“It’s one of the things that is sort of on my plate, [that] I’m interested in doing. I’m not certain if it’s the next movie. Part of that is my schedule. Part of that is Jennifer’s schedule as well. But it’s definitely something that we intend to do.”

In 2004 director Ron Howard and writer Paul Attanasio got the ball rolling on making the film only to stall out. And then in 2009, director Tom Hooper and writer Christopher Hampton made a second attempt to no avail

The story was first put on screen in 1955 by the great Elia Kazan starring James Dean and Richard Davalos. It hit the small screen in 1981 as a TV Mini-Series.

Ross goes on to explain how he got involved in the adaptation:

“My kids had actually read it as their summer reading at high school. And I read it along with them, because I’d never read the book, I’d only seen the movie. And I loved the novel. Then I gave it to Justine Ciarrocchi, who is Jennifer’s best friend [and producing partner]. Justine read it and thought, ‘Oh my God, this is the greatest novel’ — Justine is wildly into literature and is very, very literate and is a good friend of my kids as well as mine. Then she gave it to Jennifer and Jennifer ‘This is incredible.  I love this novel. I’d love to play Cathy Ames.’ So then I called Brian Grazer, who had been a producer on various incarnations of East of Eden, and said, ‘I would love to do this and I think Jennifer would love to play Cathy Ames.’ The rights had just become available again and we set it up at Universal.”

Ross also took time to explain his decision not to direct The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, the second installment in the film series:

“We got to the end of the process on Hunger Games, and I had literally been only focused on that with the intention of doing it, and then Jennifer’s schedule on [X-Men Days of Future Past] made it very clear to everybody that we were going to have to start the movie in September. I write and direct. That’s just my process. So first I write, and then I direct. And that’s a linear process for me.  So, that was an eight-month process on the first movie. It was going to have to be a four-month process on the second movie, and I didn’t think there was adequate time to write a script and then prep that movie in what normally takes me the same amount of time to write the script.  Now it’s different when you don’t have to write the script and somebody else can be writing while you can be prepping.  But those aren’t simultaneous processes for me and I didn’t feel that I would be doing the movie any service in order to do that.”