Polanski to remake Oliver Twist
2003-09-10 12:30
Paris - Oscar-winning director Roman Polanski is to remake the classic Dickens' novel Oliver Twist which has already spawned a dozen screen versions since the first attempt in 1912.
Polanski, a judge at the Deauville film festival in northern France, told the American Variety magazine that he would make the film in Europe next summer with British actors and a script by Ronald Harwood, who won an Oscar this year for the Polanski film The Pianist.
Polanski himself picked up a directing Oscar for the film which drew on his childhood experiences as a Polish Jew in a Krakow ghetto.
French producer Robert Benmussa, who co-produced The Pianist, confirmed that he was joining forces with Polanski again.
"There's been a heap of televised versions of Oliver Twist, but no film since Carol Reed's 1968 musical comedy and David Lean's 1948 black and white version," Benmussa said.
"Young people today don't know it. And the meeting of the worlds of Dickens and Polanski will be interesting."
Polanski, whose other works include Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby, said that it was his 10- and five-year-old children who gave him the wish to adapt the famous novel.