No, Netflix‘s Nineteen Steps is not a theatrical sequel to A Perfect Circle’s 2003 sophomore album Thirteenth Step. It’s an up-and-coming film project starring Stranger Things and Enola Holmes actress Millie Bobby Brown, which now has The King’s Speech and Cats director Tom Hooper at the helm. The film, based on Brown’s novel of the same name, draws on the experiences of Brown’s grandmother.
Written by Brown and Kathleen McGurl, the story “follows Nellie Morris, an 18-year-old girl living in the East London neighborhood of Bethnal Green,” Deadline wrote in its exclusive article. “Over the course of the book, Nellie navigates the challenges of wartime life, including the threat of bombings, rationing, and the emotional turmoil of being separated from loved ones, while charting a new romance with American airman Ray. At the historical core of the novel is the Bethnal Green Tube disaster, one of the worst civilian disasters in the UK during the war, where 173 people were killed in a crush as they sought shelter during an air raid.”
William Morrow published Brown’s novel, which became a New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller. Brown partnered with Kathleen McGurl to adapt the story. On the film front, four-time Oscar nominee Anthony McCarten will adapt Brown’s novel for Netflix. Brown and her husband, Jake Bongiovi, produce Nineteen Steps via PCMA alongside Jonathan Eirich for Rideback. While the project is still in development, Deadline reports that Brown could lead the film, with Nick Reynolds executive producing through Rideback.
Millie Bobby Brown recently bowed out of Netflix’s Olympic gymnastics drama Perfect, the Gia Coppola-directed film about “Magnificent Seven” gold medalist Kerri Strug. Strug dominated the gymnastics scene in 1996. She was essential to landing the gold medal after performing a vault on an injured ankle. The photograph of her perfect landing “went viral,” as much as something can back then. Another photo of Strug’s coach carrying her off the mat is just as iconic.
Why doesn’t Netflix replace Brown and continue production? In addition to leading the film as Kerri Strug, Brown was set to produce through her PMCA banner, with Nik Bower (Riverstone Pictures) and Thomas Benski (Magna Studios) also producing.
If I had my s**t together, I’d write a screenplay about my grandmother’s early days as a wartime nurse and Rat Pack groupie. She used to party with Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and others before she met and fell in love with my grandfather, a skilled lantern maker from New York. She turned down a Hollywood contract to star in films for love. If that’s not material for a film, I don’t know what is.