George Clooney, Grant Heslov to Produce 'August: Osage County' for Weinstein Co.

3:52 PM PDT 6/18/2012 by Borys Kit

George Clooney & Grant Heslov: "The Ides of March"

In the 1980s, Heslov loaned acting classmate Clooney $100 to get head shots. Good investment. They got original screenplay Oscar noms for Good Night, and Good Luck and hope their co-writing luck holds.

Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts are attached to star in the adaptation of the Tony Award-winning play.

George Clooney and his Smokehouse Pictures producing partner Grant Heslov have come aboard to produce the big-screen adaptation of August: Osage County for the Weinstein Co.

Julia Roberts and Meryl Streep are attached to star in the project, based on the Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning play. John Wells (Company Men) will direct.

Clooney and Heslov join producersSteve Traxler andJean Doumanian.

Written by Tracy Letts, the play follows the women of a family whose lives have splintered in many directions until a crisis brings them back to their childhood home and to the dysfunctional woman who raised them.

Streep will play the pill-popping matriarch, while Roberts will portray her daughter.

Smokehouse most recently produced last year’s The Ides of March, another adaptation of a play, and is developing The Monuments Men, a World War II thriller Clooney would direct.