A new film adaptation of Emily Brontë’s classic novel Wuthering Heights is in the works. John Maybury — who helms upcoming lesbianish film The Edge of Love and is openly gay — is attached to direct, and Natalie Portman is attached to star as Catherine Earnshaw. According to IMDb.com, the project is tentatively scheduled for release in 2010.

This isn’t the first adaptation of the novel. Probably the most famous version is the 1939 film, starring Laurence Olivier as Heathcliff and Merle Oberon as Cathy. Fans of the BBC’s recent drama Mistresses might be interested to know that Oberon — who hid her Indian heritage to ‘pass’ as white in the racist Hollywood of the 1930s — is actually the great-aunt of Shelley Conn (below, left) who starred in Mistresses as the bisexual Jessica, and also played the leading lesbian in Nina's Heavenly Delights (out this week on DVD in the U.S.). … continue reading