A film adaptation of Alice Sebold’s book Lucky will not be moving forward, it has been reported.
The book, which centred on Sebold’s rape as an 18-year-old and the consequent trauma that it cast over her life, was being made into a movie with Tim Mucciante, who has a production company called Red Badge Films, originally signed on as an executive producer – and You star Victoria Pedretti set to play Sebold. However, the conviction was overturned last week, with convicted attacker Anthony Broadwater cleared of the charge.
Variety has now reported that Lucky has been abandoned. The project lost funding months ago according to sources, while Mucciante and Pedretti had also departed from the project ahead of others stepping off.
When approached by The Guardian, a spokesperson for Sebold’s publisher Scribner declined to comment on the conviction’s overturning.
“Neither Alice Sebold nor Scribner has any comment. Scribner has no plans to update the text of Lucky at this time,” they said.
Broadwater had been petitioning for freedom across the 16 years that he spent in prison and after his release in 1998. However, Mucciante played a crucial role in the case being overturned.
According to a report in The New York Times Mucciante left the project in June, and decided to hire a private investigator to examine the evidence against Broadwater. The result of the private investigation was then taken up by Broadwater’s legal team, which helped to clear his name.
To date, Lucky has sold over one million copies, with Sebold going on to pen The Lovely Bones, which Peter Jackson adapted for the screen.