Breaking News: Aaron Sorkin to Write New Adaptation of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD; Coming to Broadway

Producer Scott Rudin has announced plans to bring Harper Lee's classic Pulitzer Prize-winning novel TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD to Broadway for the 2017-2018 season. Academy Award winner Aaron Sorkin will write a new stage adaptation of Lee's novel, and the production will be directed by Tony Award winner Bartlett Sher.

Published in 1960, Harper Lee's debut novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" was an immediate and astonishing success, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and publishing in ten languages within a year of its release. The book, considered one of the great classics of modern American literature, went on to become a global phenomenon, with more than 50 million copies in print to date. "To Kill a Mockingbird" has moved international readers for half a century, with editions published in over 40 languages including Persian, Dutch, Norwegian, Russian, Vietnamese, Armenian, Chinese, and Esperanto.

Based on an event that occurred near her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama in the 1930s, Lee's story of racial injustice and the destruction of childhood innocence centers on small-town lawyer and single father Atticus Finch (modeled after Lee's father, attorney Amasa Lee), his young daughter Scout, her older brother Jem, and their mysterious neighbor, the reclusive Arthur "Boo" Radley. Written during the early stages of the Civil Rights Movement-at a time when Jim Crow laws were still in effect in many Southern states-Lee's novel held a mirror to the culture of racism of the Deep South.

The influence and power of "To Kill a Mockingbird" has made the book a centerpiece of the high school curriculum; the most widely read book in the United States in grades 9-12, it has never been out of print in hardcover or paperback. When asked in a Library of Congress survey, "What book should every adult read before they die?," librarians across the United States voted "To Kill a Mockingbird" number one-followed by the Bible.

In 2007, Lee was recognized with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which cited her "outstanding contribution to America's literary tradition." In 2010, President Barack Obama awarded Lee the National Medal of Arts, an award given for "outstanding contributions to the excellence, growth, support, and availability of the arts"-the nation's highest honor for artistic achievement.Aaron Sorkin's plays include A Few Good Men and The Farnsworth Invention. A winner of the Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award, the Writers Guild Award, and a BAFTA Award for his screenplay for The Social Network, Sorkin's other films include Steve Jobs (Golden Globe Award, BAFTA Award nomination), Moneyball (Academy Award and BAFTA Award nominations, Broadcast Film Critics Association Award), The American President (Golden Globe Award nomination), and the screen adaptation of A Few Good Men (Golden Globe Award nomination). In addition to the long-running series "The West Wing," for which he won four Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, two Humanitas Prizes, and a Writers Guild Award, he created the series "Sports Night" (Humanitas Prize, Writers Guild Award, Emmy Award nomination), "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," and "The Newsroom" (Golden Globe Award nomination).

Bartlett Sher is currently represented on Broadway by Lincoln Center Theater's production of The King and I (Tony Award nomination) and the new Broadway production of Fiddler on the Roof. He is the Resident Director of Lincoln Center Theater, where he has directed Golden Boy by Clifford Odets (Tony Award nomination), Blood and Gifts by J.T. Rogers, August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone (Tony Award nomination), Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific (Tony Award), Awake and Sing! by Clifford Odets (Tony Award nomination), and The Light in the Piazza by Craig Lucas and Adam Guettel (Tony Award nomination). He has directed operas for the Metropolitan Opera (L'Elisir d'Amore, Le Comte Ory, Les Contes d'Hoffmann, and Il Barbiere di Siviglia), the Salzburg Festival (Roméo et Juliette), and Seattle Opera/New York City Opera (Mourning Becomes Electra).