CBS Films has picked up the rights to Olivia Twisted, says a story at The Hollywood Reporter. Ashley Greene was once attached to play the lead role but it is unclear if that remains the case.
A modern-day retelling of Charles Dickens’ “Oliver Twist,” Olivia Twisted arrives from screenwriter Michael Roberts and, in addition to gender-swapping and doubling the age of the lead, places Olivia in control of a band of criminal street urchins who find themselves in the middle of a gang war after a kidnapping job goes bad.
Dickens’ text has been adapted for the screen many times over, including a recent Roman Polanski version. It was also famously adapted by David Lean in 1948, as a musical, Oliver! in 1968. Non-traditional tellings of the tale are also not uncommon; in 1988 Walt Disney Pictures released an animated version, Oliver and Company that featured an orange cat in the lead.
Michael De Luca and Alissa Phillips are attached to produce.
