Reed Morano Set To Direct Film Adaptation Of Kurt Vonnegut Novel ‘Player Piano’

EXCLUSIVE: Reed Morano has been set to direct Player Piano, an adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut’s first novel. Scripted by Matthew Walker, the picture will be made by Fabulascope, Picture Films and Verdi Productions.

First published under the title Utopia 14 in 1952, Vonnegut’s novel takes a darkly comic look at an alternate 1950s in which mechanization has made human labor obsolete – forcing a widening divide between the bored, suddenly-useless populace and the handful of office managers who keep the machines running. Dr. Paul Proteus, an up-and-coming executive at the Federal Apparatus Corporation, finds his life imploding – or perhaps he’s just beginning to see things clearly. Will he rise to the top of a company that makes people worthless? Or rebel against the system for the sake of all humankind?

Picture Films’ Margot Hand will produce alongside Morano and Walker. Chad A. Verdi (The Irishman) will executive produce, along with Christopher Donnelly, Chad Verdi Jr., Paul Luba and Sera Verdi.

“There’s no story more important to tell right now than this one,” said Morano, who became the only woman to win both the Emmy and DGA Awards the same year for directing the pilot of the dystopian The Handmaid’s Tale. “Everywhere, across every industry, people are realizing how profoundly AI is redefining the value of the human contribution. Who will be replaced next? It can be terrifying – which is exactly why we need a story as hilarious and disarming as this one.”

Said Verdi Productions’ Chad A Verdi: “Kurt Vonnegut has such a specific voice in his writing, filled with satire, dark humor and exposure of the absurdities of life and the human condition with sharp, unsettling clarity. Despite being written in the 1950s, Player Piano is just as relevant today as it was then, perhaps even more.”

Morano is repped by CAA and LBI Entertainment.