BookTok enthusiasts, rejoice! Netflix just announced via Twitter that Taylor Jenkins Reid‘s New York Times Best-Selling novel, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, is being adapted for the small screen by Russian Doll director Leslye Headland and Little Fires Everywhere showrunner Liz Tigelaar.
Reid’s historical fiction-meets-romance novel, which won a Goodreads Choice Award nomination for Best Historical Fiction in 2017, follows the story’s namesake, Evelyn Hugo, is Hollywood celebrity.
With every book-to-movie adaptation, devoted readers predictably get nervous about how the film will do the original literary work justice. And we’re already seeing that in responses to Netflix’s news, with readers expressing that they are “scared of the casting announcement,” while others are “equally excited and terrified of this adaptation.”
Some fans believe the film should be a miniseries similar to Daisy Jones and the Six ( Reid’s novels which was adapted by Amazon’s Prime Video) with each husband being the focus of their own individual episode.
While Reid herself has not made any concrete decisions about casting as of now, she told the Associated Press at the end of February that “there’s just a short list of women that I am incredibly, incredibly excited about.”
Nonetheless, fans have been buzzing about which stars they want to see onscreen, including Jessica Chastain as Celia St. James, another one of the book’s fictional Hollywood starlets. Chastain revealed to Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live in April that she would be open to playing the role, saying, “Sure, send me a script,” per Cosmopolitan. Still, other loyal readers think Saoirse Ronan is the best choice for the part.
Fans are also vying for Raven Goodwin and Nathalie Emmanuel as Monique Grant, a journalist and Hugo’s biographer, who is also the first character readers are introduced to in the story.
As for the title role of Evelyn Hugo, Ana de Armas and Anya Taylor-Joy are two top contenders for the younger version of the character, while there is talk of Rita Moreno playing the elder version.
Pop Sugar UK released their “dream cast,” which outlines some ideas for the seven husbands, such as Harry Styles as Mick Riva and Alexander Skarsgård as Hugo’s fourth husband Rex North, plus Hugh Skinner as her fifth husband Harry Cameron and Alfred Enoch as Monique’s father James Grant.
Netflix has not yet set a release date for the film, but according to Tudum, updates will be shared once production begins.