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‘Yes, God, Yes’ Helmer Karen Maine To Direct Screen Gems Rom-Com ‘Miss Conception’ From Elizabeth Banks’ Brownstone Productions

EXCLUSIVE: Elizabeth Banks and Max Handelman-led Brownstone Productions has tapped writer/director Karen Maine to direct Miss Conception, a romantic comedy set up at Screen Gems. Maine, who made her feature directorial debut with indie comedy Yes, God, Yes, is directing the pic from a script re-written by Lauryn Kahn based on a spec from Savion Einstein.

Plot details are being kept under wraps.

Banks, Handelman, and Alison Small will serve as executive producers with Scott Strauss and Michael Bitar overseeing for Screen Gems. No word on when production will commence but casting will soon be underway.

Maine’s Yes, God, Yes premiered at last year’s SXSW and was picked up for distribution by Vertical Entertainment. Stranger Things‘ Natalia Dyers stars Alice, a Catholic teenager in the early 2000s who discovers masturbating and struggles to suppress her new urges in the face of eternal damnation. Maine also recently directed the BBC pilot Starstruck, which received a straight to series order by the BBC and HBO Max. The six-episode series follows a young woman in London who works two dead-end jobs and has to navigate the awkward morning after she discovers the complications of accidentally sleeping with a movie star.

Brownstone has a slew of film projects in the cannon including Invisible Woman, which Banks will direct and star in, The Paperbag Princess, written by Katie Silverman and co-produced with Margot Robbie’s Lucky Chap Productions, Uncanny Valley, based on the recently published memoir by Anna Wiener, and The Magic School Bus live-action hybrid adaptation at Universal Pictures, which has a first-look film deal with Brownstone

Maine is repped by WME, 42, and Granderson Des Rochers; Kahn by WME. Banks, Handelman, and Brownstone Productions are repped by UTA, Untitled Entertainment, and Ziffren Brittenham.

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