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Ben Stiller Producing Gary Shteyngart Adaptation

Shteyngart’s 2010 novel Super Sad True Love Story to become TV series

by
Gabriela Geselowitz
February 10, 2015
Ben Stiller on December 15, 2014. (Ian Gavan/Getty Images)
Ben Stiller on December 15, 2014. (Ian Gavan/Getty Images)

Gary Shteyngart is headed for the small screen, and Ben Stiller is leading the charge. Stiller is producing a television adaptation of Shteyngart’s 2010 novel, Super Sad True Love Story, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Super Sad True Love Story is set a near-future dystopia of materialism and political repression, but the focus is on a Russian-born Jewish man and his infatuation with a Korean-American young woman. The book is Shteyngart’s most recent novel—he’s since published Little Failure, a memoir (also about a Russian-born Jewish man who eventually falls in love with a Korean-American woman).

Shteyngart adapted the script with writer and producer Karl Gajdusek, and both have signed on as executive producers of the show. Stiller will direct multiple episodes of the hour-long dramedy.

Casting for the series is scheduled to begin soon. Who should play the schlubby, middle-aged Jewish protagonist? Jack Black, David Schwimmer, Adam Sandler—the possibilities are endless.

@Shteyngart Super excited to try to not screw it up. #greatbook #SOmedia



— Ben Stiller (@RedHourBen) February 10, 2015

Gabriela Geselowitz is a writer and the former editor of Jewcy.com.