By ANDREW RODGERS
Journal Editor
The debut memoir “Confessions of a Rebel Debutante,” written by North Carolina-native Anna Fields, has been optioned to be made into a feature film. Fields is writing the script adaptation with Susan Seidelman attached to direct. Agents Gayla Nethercott and Gary Pearl are shopping the project to producers and studios.
“My memoir is a snarky, modern take on the traditional ‘rags to riches’ or ‘ugly-ducking-turns-into-a-swan’ story about a chubby, nerdy girl who starts out as a quiet, uber-feminine wannabe Debutante and then transitions into a courageous, outspoken Rebel during her years at an all-girls boarding school,” said Fields. “It’s a story of how I outgrew my childhood insecurities, came out of my shell and developed the self-confidence that’s allowed me to thrive at an Ivy League university, move to LA and then NYC, and to make a name for myself as a TV and screenwriter.
Fields grew up in Burlington, North Carolina, and went to high school at Salem Academy in Winston-Salem. She got her undergraduate degree at Brown University and her MFA from NYU. Previously, she worked as a staff writer at “As the World Turns,” “One Life to Live” and “Guiding Light.” She wrote the proposal for her memoir during the 2007 writer’s strike and sold the book to Penguin Putnam in March of 2008. “Confessions of a Rebel Debutante” hit bookstores in April 2010.
Fields hopes that the film would be made in Winston-Salem. “Not only because this is where I’ve set the story,” she said, “but also because I think my project will help to further a more positive perspective of our city for outsiders and tourists.”
Currently she’s working on her next book, “Tickled Pink,” and teaching undergraduate screenwriting courses at Wake Forest University. For more information, visit www.rebeldebutante.com.
