A cademy Award-nominated Toronto filmmaker Deepa Mehta is tackling a debut novel for her next feature film project.

Mehta will write and direct Burnt Sugar, based on Avni Doshi’s novel of the same name, for L.A.-based prodco Propagate Content, which has acquired the film rights to adapt the book and will also produce.

Mehta’s credits include a previous adaptation of Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and Shyam Selvadurai’s Funny Boy – which was selected to represent Canada in the Best International Feature Film 2021 race, but was withdrawn when it fell short of non-English language requirements. 

Best known for the elemental trilogy Fire, Earth and Water, Mehta has also recently delved into television, directing the pilot for the acclaimed Apple series Little America and Showtime’s upcoming Yellowjackets.

“Depicting complicated human connections are what drive most of my projects and I look forward to delving into the complex, layered and at times surprisingly dark mother-daughter relationship that is so shockingly illustrated in this novel,” said Mehta in a statement.

“Burnt Sugar is often sprinkled with razor sharp humour and its unexpected take on the old-as-time relationship left me gasping. It grabbed me from its first sentence and I couldn’t say yes fast enough when I was asked to bring the vision to the screen.”

Shortlisted for the prestigious 2020 Booker Prize, and longlisted for the 2021 Women’s Prize, the English-language version of Burnt Sugar has sold over 150,000 copies worldwide and translated into 26 languages. The novel is also being adapted into a play by Carmen Nasr with the intention of premiering in London in 2023.

Set in Pune, India, Burnt Sugar tells the story of Tara and is a love story about obsession and betrayal between mother and daughter.

The deal was negotiated by Pontas Literary & Film Agency’s Anna Soler-Pont on Doshi’s behalf.

Propagate Content was founded by veteran producers Ben Silverman and Howard T. Owens and has offices in L.A., New York and Paris. Projects currently underway for Netflix, Fox, CBS and TBS, and are working on a U.S. version of The Eurovision Song Contest.

Pictured: Deepa Mehta, photo by Janick Laurent