Roman Polanski to Direct ‘Venus in Fur’ Film

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Is there an analyst in the house? Because we feel woefully unqualified to tease out all the layers of psycho-sexual complexity in the following news: Roman Polanski is filming a French-language adaptation of Venus in Fur, David Ives’ Broadway meta-take on Leopold von Sacher-Masoch’s 1870 erotic novella Venus in Furs. The play, which we loved despite the fact that it also kind of tore us up inside, finds a writer desperate to find a domineering Wanda to anchor his stage adaptation of the book visited by a mercurial actress who fits the role all too well. Titled La Vénus à la fourrure, Polanski’s version will star his wife, Emmanuelle Seigner (psychoanalysts, anything?), opposite Louis Garrel, who Americans will know best from his role in Bernardo Bertolucci’s taboo-busting 2003 film The Dreamers. As Screen Daily reports, Polanski has pushed the project to the top of his to-do list, saying, “I’m so impatient to direct this brilliant comedy that I’ve decided to shoot it immediately, ahead of D., the script and pre-production of which requires several more months.”