For all the news and drama surrounding film adaptations of Michael Chabon’s Mysteries of Pittsburgh and Kavalier & Clay, it’s easy sometimes to forget that Ayelet Waldman could have a movie of her own hitting theaters.

Waldman’s Love and Other Impossible Pursuits was optioned by Walt Disney before it even hit bookstores. This site hasn’t reported much on it, but it’s been in the works and drawing in talent.

Don Roos, the writer and director of The Opposite of Sex and Happy Endings, is writing and possibly directing the film adaptation. Waldman confirmed that Jennifer Lopez has been cast as the main actress.

“Yup, Jlo is in, and we’ve got preliminary financing!” Waldman said via e-mail.

Lopez is prepping for the part, according to Harper’s Bazaar.

“I’m very excited,” Lopez told Entertainment Weekly in September. “[Roos]’s fantastic. When he knew I was coming [to Toronto], he actually e-mailed me. He goes, ‘How are you doing? Are you nervous?’ I was like, ‘Yeah!’ He saw the film [El Cantante] because before we decided to work together I wanted him to see it. And he was like, ‘It’s the best female performance in five years — don’t worry about it!’ I was like, ‘I love you!’ [Laughs]”

In an interview with Zulkey last year, Waldman called Roos’ screenplay “awesome.” “It’s so good – he took lots of my jokes and made them funnier,” she said. “I loved it.”

A history hunting retreat in California favored by Ayelet Waldman and Michael Chabon was leveled by a fire Wednesday, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

Manka’s Inverness Lodge, located in Marin County, was known for its gourmet cuisine. Artists and celebrities, including Robert Redford, Brad Pitt, Chabon and Waldman, frequented the famed inn. Waldman said she and Chabon often went to Manka’s for pleasure and to work.

“We’ve gone there for countless romantic weekends,” Waldman said.

“It was our favorite hotel, absolutely. It was like the most gorgeous hunting lodge you’ve ever been to. Everything was rustic, but exquisite,” she said. “It just breaks my heart.”

In a new interview, Ayelet Waldman reflects on how she and Michael Chabon work together.

“Just the other day, (for example) I was at a point in my novel when I knew what needed to happen emotionally, but not how to do it,” Waldman told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer in an article published Friday. “So we walked and he asked questions and we brainstormed and over the course of the walk I found the plot point I was looking for. We both do this for each other all the time.”

To read the whole article, click here.

What is “Jews with swords”?

Not content to live with the very “Snakes on a Plane” title Michael Chabon has cooked up for his 16-part serialized novel, scheduled to first appear in January in the New York Times Magazine, this Web site owner went straight to the source, or next to it, for the answer.

“It’s a swashbuckling adventure story set around the year 1000,” Ayelet Waldman, Chabon’s wife, said in an e-mail. “And that’s all he’ll give you. :)”

(Waldman is answering e-mails for Chabon as he is “only in intermittent email range,” a forwarding e-mail says).

Michael Chabon will author a 16-part serialized novel in The New York Times Magazine, temporarily called “Jews with swords,” the Pulitzer Prize-winning author announced Friday.

Chabon provided no plot details about the Times stories other than the working title, which he swears is “the working title only!” The stories are scheduled to begin hitting print sometime in early January after Michael Connelly’s serial completes, Chabon wrote on his Web site.

Chabon also announced Friday that he had been replaced as the screenwriter for Disney’s martial arts picture Snow and the Seven.

A brief recounting by Chabon of the end of his job on the film went like this: “They love you, but they want to go in another direction.” “What kind of dir–” “More of a fun direction.” “Oh.”

No word on who has replaced Chabon.

Chabon said his next novel, The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, is “completed and headed for copy-editing.” It should hit bookstores in May 2007, much sooner than anticipated (Chabon said in December it wouldn’t hit stores until winter 2007).

Chabon noted that the film adaptation of Mysteries of Pittsburgh is “about to enter the magical estate known as ‘principal photography,’ in the great city of Pittsburgh.” News reports circulated earlier this week that Nick Nolte has joined the cast. (Nextbook, by the way, is carrying an account of that crazy 80’s extra casting call).

But don’t expect any new news on the film adaptation Kavalier & Clay, at least not from Chabon. He posted this missive on his site regarding the film: “Status: Complying With Polite Request To Stop Posting About It On This Website, Already.”

Chabon’s previous posting regarding the film had been to say the Natalie Portman might get cast as Rosa Saks. Unlike usual with Chabon’s Web site updates, links to the posting began widely popping up throughout the blogosphere, and several Hollywood news Web sites quoted it at length.

Cinematical quotes Chabon’s wife, Ayelet Waldman, as saying Kavalier & Clay has “not yet been greenlit.”

Waldman also updated her Web site, with an update on the family:

“We’re in Maine, on something of an extended vacation. Vacation for us means we don’t do anything but work and play with the kids. It’s been pretty grand, but frankly I’m surprised I haven’t done as much reading as I expected. Maybe it’s because the kids are obsessed with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and we watch it every night. I’ve also spent time getting my butt kicked at Scrabble, as usual. Playing Scrabble with my husband is exactly no fun at all.”