Waiting for Scorsese

Or Spielberg. Or Soderbergh. Or anyone to make the movie based on their book.

Will Smith starred in the 2004 movie "I, Robot," which was written 54 years before the film's release. (20th Century Fox)

The long march of Richard Yates's "Revolutionary Road " from 1961 novel to 2008 movie was almost as tortured as the story itself, but it is increasingly the norm for American literary fiction. The bleak tale of 1950s angst and blasted hopes, which opens next week and stars Kate Winsletand Leonardo DiCaprio, drew Hollywood interest almost as soon as it was published, but it came to naught in Yates's lifetime (he died in 1992). It required the personal passion of Winslet and her director husband, Sam Mendes, to bring the novel to the screen. Without such commitment by a heavyweight, challenging literary novels are a long shot in the current Hollywood marketplace.

"It's changing before our eyes," said Richard Russo, the Maine-based writer whose novels "Nobody's Fool" and "Empire Falls" were made into movies. "The great directors like Robert Benton made character-driven movies like 'Kramer vs. Kramer' and 'Places in the Heart,' with big studio budgets. The conventional wisdom now is that those movies don't get made, or they get made in the art-house divisions."

A scan of movie listings at any one time shows a slew of films adapted from fiction. Now showing are adaptations of Stephenie Meyer's vampire-teen tale "Twilight," F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," Bernhard Schlink's 1997 novel "The Reader," and Kate DiCamillo's children's story "The Tale of Despereaux."

Given all these, writers might well imagine that works of fiction hop easily from bookstore to box office. But they'd be wrong.

Jonathan Kirsch, a Los Angeles author, agent, and publishing lawyer, is blunt about the odds against any one novel making it: "Infinitesimal," he said. "If it were one out of a thousand, I'd be shocked." Of the 500 to 600 movies, counting art-house films, that are made yearly, only a fraction of those are based on novels, Kirsch said. And there are more than 50,000 works of fiction published each year, according to W.W. Bowker, publisher of "Books in Print."

Said Boston literary agent John Taylor Williams: "An author shouldn't be surprised if, after a movie option is sold, the movie is never made."

The dream of Hollywood beguiles many struggling novelists, since blockbuster movies sometimes are made from literary novels: Russo's books, Dennis Lehane's "Mystic River," Michael Ondaatje's "The English Patient." Of course, someone wins a lottery every day, too, but movieland hates to gamble. In the movie business, as with publishing, the game is increasingly about looking for the certain moneymaker. "Money makes the decision in every field," said longtime producer Harry Gittes, who produced "About Schmidt" and "The Girl Next Door." "If a book doesn't have a strong plot line or is not a genre piece, like sci-fi or a thriller, maybe a handful of [big-name] actors can get it made in a studio. Even then, most of the time they'll say, 'It's charming, it's a character piece - we don't want to take a chance.' "

Yet everyone craves a story. "In 25 years in publishing, at Little, Brown and as a literary agent, I've found that most novels I've worked on ended up getting optioned by somebody," said Colleen Mohyde of the Boston-based Doe Coover Agency, "but not one movie has been made." Actors, directors, producers, or sometimes just people with money will buy a movie option from an author, typically as little as $5,000 for a year or 18 months on a low-selling book. In the early stages, they can be as starry-eyed as authors. In his first encounter with film optioning, Russo was wined and dined at New York's fabled Algonquin Hotel by a small-time producer who had taken an option on his 1986 novel, "Mohawk."

"He had a list of screenwriters and actors," Russo said. "These people may not have raised dollar one, but making lists is what they do: 'Say, what do you think about Brad Pitt? Why not Robin Williams?' I'm thinking, 'Are you nuts? Robin Williams has never heard of anyone at this table, and he probably never will.' "

Sometimes movies are made so long after an option that authors have almost given up hope. Novelist Elinor Lipman, who lives in Northampton, sold an option on her 1990 first novel, "Then She Found Me," 19 years ago. The movie came out last April, starring Helen Hunt and Bette Midler. "I thought the day would never come," Lipman said. "My son was in the first grade, and when I told him my book might become a movie, he said, 'Will it be PG, so I can see it?' He graduated from college this year."

The movie was made, though. The Yates model is more common, as is that of Hilma Wolitzer, author of 12 novels. "I was always an option, never a bride," Wolitzer said by phone from New York. Her first novel, "Ending," came out in 1974 and was optioned by director Bob Fosse. "It's about a young husband who dies of cancer," Wolitzer said. "The movie was never made." Her second novel, "In the Flesh," was optioned by Danny Arnold, the producer of the sitcom "Barney Miller." "He not only optioned it," said Wolitzer, "but flew me to California to write the script. I had a lot of fun, but nothing came of it."

Then came her third book, "Hearts," published in 1980. First it was optioned by actress Kristy McNichol, and then by Jane Fonda, who renewed the option several times, doubling and tripling the fee. "I was very hopeful," Wolitzer said. Loni Anderson and Carol Burnett then took an option. Finally, Ted Turner in 1994 bought permanent rights for a six-figure fee. "No complaints about that," Wolitzer said. "I bought a house with the money. I was extremely happy and thought, surely someone who would spend that much money would follow up with a movie. I found out it doesn't work that way." She's not bitter, and is happy that the book is still in print.

Like Wolitzer, literary writers sometimes can almost make a living on Hollywood, without disappointment, if they can keep the stars out of their eyes. One such case is South Carolina novelist Rebecca Godwin. Her 1994 book, "Keeper of the House," about a brothel in a small Southern town, had good reviews and sales, and remains in print. "A man interested in starting a film industry in South Carolina approached us 10 years ago," Godwin said by phone from her home in Pawley's Island. "He loves the book and won't let go." The optioner, Michael Lentine of Earth Artist Studios in Columbia, S.C., has continued to pay a five-figure option fee every year for "Keeper of the House."

"I'm looking for stories that have universal meaning, that transcend borders," Lentine said in a phone interview. "Rebecca's way of telling the story is unique. We're trying to change the paradigm to make it a story-driven industry." Even though no film is in the offing, Lentine said, "the ancillary benefit is the good feeling I get because it helps Rebecca keep writing."

That's fine with Godwin. "It feels like this great blessing," she said. "I teach one term a year at Bennington, and this has allowed me to do that. I'm down here in South Carolina working on my next novel. Someone out there continues to believe in the book, which is amazing and lovely, and it also gives me the freedom and time that I wouldn't have otherwise."