Always contemplative in the roles she chose and in her performances in front of the camera, Sarah Polley has shown a similar trait with her directorial projects. She floored us with her debut, 2006's Away from Her, then moved to the affecting Take this Waltz (This is Seth Rogen's best performance, by the way) and the convention-breaking documentary, Stories We Tell. Now she's lined up her next big screen effort, and it may be her biggest challenge yet.
Polley will direct an adaptation of Zoe Whittall‘s The Best Kind Of People, which follows the Woodbury family who become pariahs when husband and father George Woodbury is accused of a sex crime. Polley will pull double duty on this one as she'll also pen the script. Here's a synopsis for the book which fleshes things out a bit:
The Woodburys cherish life in the affluent, bucolic suburb of Avalon Hills, Connecticut. George is a beloved science teacher at the local prep school, a hero who once thwarted a gunman, and his wife, Joan, is a hardworking ER nurse. They have brought up their children in this thriving town of wooded yards and sprawling lakes.
Then one night a police car pulls up to the Woodbury home and George is charged with sexual misconduct — with students from his daughter’s school. As he sits in prison awaiting trial and claiming innocence — is it possible? — Joan vaults between denial and rage as friends and neighbors turn cold. Their daughter, seventeen-year-old Sadie, is a popular high school senior who becomes a social outcast — and finds refuge in an unexpected place. Her brother, Andrew, a lawyer in New York, returns home to support the family, only to confront unhappy memories from his past. A writer tries to exploit their story, while an unlikely men’s rights activist group attempts to recruit Sadie for their cause.
Sounds like powerful, complicated material which is exactly what Polley has gravitated to. Currently she's working on her Netflix series, Alias Grace, so we may be waiting a while before this gets moving. [THR]
