'Spectacular Now' Writers Set to Adapt 'Rules of Civility' (Exclusive)

Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber, the hot scribe duo who are coming off the Sundance fave The Spectacular Now, have been hired to write Lionsgate’s adaptation of Rules of Civility.

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The novel by Amor Towles, published by Viking in 2011, is a period piece of manners, set in late-1930s New York City. The story centers on a young woman’s rise from a Wall Street secretarial pool to the heights of Manhattan society, examines how spur-of-the-moment decisions can define lives for decades to come and features allusions to such literary greats as F. Scott Fitzgerald and Truman Capote.

The book was on the New York Times best-seller charts for 27 weeks, Oprah Winfrey named it the most cinematic book of 2011, and The Wall Street Journal listed it in its top 10 fiction books of the year. 

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Lionsgate picked up the project in October after the company’s motion picture group president Erik Feig spent eight months trying to persuade Towles to part with the tightly held movie rights.

Feig is overseeing the project with Lionsgate senior vp production Gillian Bohrer.

Neustadter and Weber broke though with their spec (500) Days of Summer but are quickly establishing themselves as the go-to book-to-film writers. Civility is the fourth major book adaptation for the guys and was a highly sought after gig.

Not only did they tackle Spectacular Now, which stars Miles Teller and Shailene Woodley and earned rave reviews at Sundance, but the pair have worked on adapting YA sensation The Fault in Our Stars and wrote Rosaline, a screen translation of When You Were Mine set up at Fox 2000 with Shawn Levy producing.

They also are writing Where’d You Go, Bernadette, Annapurna and Color Force’s adaptation of the acclaimed Maria Semple novel.

Neustadter and Weber are repped by CAA, Kaplan/Perrone Entertainment and Myman Greenspan.