This content contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
At first glance, Piranesi by Susanna Clarke is not an intuitive book to try to adapt to the screen. It takes place in a labyrinthian house of endlessly stretching hallways where an ocean threatens to overtake the rooms at any moment. It’s also mostly centered on just one character. Put those two factors together and you have a high-budget film with a narrow appeal — it’s more thought experiment than action movie.
But it turns out that these limitations might just take a little creativity to get around, because the stop motion animation studio Laika — who have made films like Coraline, The Boxtrolls, and Kubo and the Two Strings — have signed on to adapt the novel.
Laika president and CEO Travis Knight says, “Piranesi is a treasure, and very dear to me. As a filmmaker, I can scarcely imagine a more joyful experience than wandering through the worlds Susanna dreamed into being. She’s one of my all-time favorite authors, and…has created a beautiful, devastating and ultimately life-affirming work of art.”
Susanna Clarke says, “Animation is one of my favorite things. I’ve been inspired by so many animated movies; and Laika has produced such extraordinary work — movies like Coraline and Kubo and the Two Strings, full of beauty and wonder and weirdness. I’m thrilled that Piranesi has found a home with them and I can’t wait to see what they do.”
There is no release date yet for the adaptation. Laika is currently producing Wildwood, adapted from the novel by Colin Meloy.
You can read more about this story at IndieWire.
Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in Breaking in Books.