Dave Eggers Hired For Rewrites To "Captain America"

The author of A HEARTBREAKING WORK OF STAGGERING GENIUS has been having a couple flirtations with Hollywood over the past year, but it appears to be love: According to yesterday's Hollywood Reporter, he's taking over from Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely on the script for the long-gestating "Captain America" adaptation starring Chris Evans.

I'll admit, having Eggers on board does raise my interest in the project, which heretofore had been limited to being annoyed that the Hollywood Reporter needed to send out every little update as "breaking news." (Slash disappointed when John Krasinski didn't get the lead.) I've probably learned more about who Captain America is in the last five minutes on Wikipedia than I ever needed to know. (For a while I thought they meant Captain Planet. See?) So if the intention was to capture my mostly blockbuster-averse demographic, mission sort of accomplished.

Still, and I know it's treacherous to say this... I wish he would get back to fiction! Last year's ZEITOUN I liked, but it was a reported story, not invention. Last year also brought us his novelization of WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, THE WILD THINGS, and I haven't gotten around to reading it yet because the excerpt in the New Yorker was just so ponderous. (Then again, that might be a perfect superhero-movie match...?) I didn't see the movie either, although I intend to check that box eventually.

And where is the glory in getting to do this -- what good will it do him, besides the paycheck? I can better understand his desire to want to write indie movies than climb aboard a project that already seems like a mess. Michael Greenberg's BEG, BORROW, STEAL includes a heartbreaking essay on being hired for rewrites, chewed up and spat out by premiere time, and it strikes me that adding Eggers to a movie that already has two screenwriters working from original materials doesn't necessarily mean any of his shine will show up in the finished product.

I guess if the movie's terrible he can always go "back" to writing books, but I'd prefer not to think of that as a backstop for the unsuccessful screenwriter, and I thought he would agree with me. Anyway, the Reporter piece is little more than a press release, as they all seem to be these days.