There may have been small screams when the Reactor newsroom saw this headline: Laika, the animation studio behind Coraline and the upcoming Wildwood, has picked up the rights to Susanna Clarke’s incomparably wonderful novel Piranesi.
Travis Knight, the company’s CEO and president, will direct the animated film. Knight previously directed Laika’s Kubo and the Two Strings and, in a rare foray into live-action, the Bumblebee film; he’s also directing the aforementioned Wildwood, which is based on Colin Meloy’s novel for young readers.
Piranesi is the story of a man, Piranesi, who lives alone in a very unusual house—if you can call it a house. It is full of statues, it has tides of its own, and it also has secrets. Here’s the novel description:
Piranesi’s house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.
There is one other person in the house-a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.
In a statement quoted by Variety, Knight said, “Piranesi is a treasure, and very dear to me. As a filmmaker, I can scarcely imagine a more joyful experience than wandering through the worlds Susanna dreamed into being. She’s one of my all-time favorite authors, and with Piranesi, Susanna has created a beautiful, devastating and ultimately life-affirming work of art. I’m humbled that she chose Laika as her home.”
As Laika is still working on Wildwood, it will be a minute before we get to see Piranesi. But we will be waiting, impatiently and excitedly. In the meantime, you might read Leah Schnelbach on Piranesi and paying attention; Alex Brown on Piranesi and trauma; Elyse Martin on Piranesi and the renaissance memory palace; or Kate Nepveu’s review of the book.
