EXCLUSIVE: John Sayles to Adapt 'Girls Like Us' for Sony

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John Sayles, the Oscar-nominated writer of Passion Fish and Lone Star, has been hired by Sony to adapt Girls Like Us, the 2008 bestseller written by Sheila Weller.

First-time feature director Katie Jacobs, a producer and director on the Fox series House, is helming and producing the project, along with Lorenzo DiBonaventura, Amy Pascal and Elizabeth Cantillon. The book traces the personal histories of singer-songwriters Carly Simon, Joni Mitchell and Carole King from childhood through their burgeoning professional careers.

Sayles' 2007 film Honeydripper took place in the music world, and he directed some iconic videos for Bruce Springsteen in the 1980s--"Born in the U.S.A." among them. He also lived through the period and was a big fan of the book. Sayles was a mentor and executive producer on Karyn Kusama's debut, Girlfight, but he plans to stick merely to the book with Jacobs. Sayles is himself a National Book Award nominee for an early novel, Union Dues.

As it happens, King is performing at the Sundance Film Festival Sunday night in Park City at the party for Troubadours, a U.S. documentary competition film that will have its premiere Saturday afternoon. Troubadours, which looks at the L.A. singer-songwriter scene of the '70s, covers some of the same ground as Girls Like Us.

The Paradigm-repped Sayles most recently wrote and directed Amigo, Honeydripper and Silver City. He also co-wrote the screenplay adaptation of The Spiderwick Chronicles.