Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal will team again, this time in adapting a groundbreaking real-life story. The pair will both produce a film based on scientist Suzanne Simard’s memoir Finding the Mother Tree, with Adams set to star.
In what reports described as a competitive battle, Adams and Bond Group co-founder Stacy O’Neil teamed with Gyllenhaal and his Nine Stories partner Riva Marker to bring to life Simard’s memoir. Simard is known for her research that uncovered how trees communicate underground through a web of fungi. Her work was ridiculed but was later praised as having “planetary significance.”
In a statement, Amy Adams and Stacy O’Neil said the book “excited us with a narrative about the awe-invoking power of nature and the compelling parallels in Suzanne’s personal life. It forever transformed our views of the world and the interconnectivity of our environment. ‘Finding the Mother Tree’ is not only a deeply beautiful memoir about one woman’s impactful life, but it’s also a call to action to protect, understand and connect with the natural world.”
Gyllenhaal and Marker called the project “part charming memoir, part crash course in forest ecology. And yet, it manages to be about the things that matter most: the ways we care for each other, fail each other, and listen to each other. After the last year and a half, its lessons about motherhood, connection, and the natural world are more timely than ever, and we are thrilled to partner with Amy, Stacy, and their company, and Suzanne Simard to adapt this majestic story to film.”
Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal previously worked together on the 2016 Tom Ford movie, Nocturnal Animals.
Originally published May 7, 2021. Updated May 8, 2021.
