The Quill Book Awards won’t be handed out until next week, but the foundation has already announced one of the winners. A press release distributed late last week named The Devil Wears Prada the first winner of the Variety Blockbuster Book to Film Award for, in the words of Quills chair Gerry Byrne, “the best translation of book content to film this year.”* Lauren Weisberger (right) will be on hand along with director David Frankel to pick up the award. Variety is published by Reed Business Information, the major corporate co-sponsor (along with NBC Universal) of the Quills.
*By which he means the year-long period between July 1, 2005 and June 30, 2006, the latter of which just happens to be the release date of Devil Wears Prada. “A nominating committee comprised of Variety staff members” chose the winner; the press release doesn’t go into what other films, if any, the committee considered. Not that I’m second-guessing their decision, but other book-to-film adaptations from the period in question include The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, The Constant Gardener, Memoirs of a Geisha, Jarhead, In Her Shoes, Everything Is Illuminated, Thank You for Smoking, Breakfast on Pluto, A Cock and Bull Story, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang …and, what the heck, let’s throw in Brokeback Mountain while we’re at it, even though that wasn’t an entire book, and V for Vendetta, even though it was a comic book. I leave the critical estimation of these motion pictures in comparison to Devil as an exercise for the reader.