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OPRAH Winfrey is making Toni Morrison's 1998 best-seller "Paradise" into her next TV movie adaptation, according to reports yesterday.
The Hollywood Reporter stressed that the deal was still in the process of being hammered out and was not final. But it said plans for the movie were ambitious and it could end up as a four-hour miniseries for late next season.
Bronx-born Darnell Martin, who directed Halle Berry in the last Oprah-produced movie, "Their Eyes Were Watching God," will reportedly write and direct the Morrison movie.
"Paradise," the first novel Morrison published after winning the Nobel Prize for literature in 1993, revolves around the murder of several woman by a group of black men from the small town of Ruby, Okla.
That story is set in 1976, but the novel jumps back in time more than 100 years to trace the turbulent history of the town and its predominantly black population.
Oprah's TV movies have become big events in recent years - in part because she has been able to convince movie stars to appear in them.
"Their Eyes Were Watching God," which aired earlier this year, drew an audience of nearly 25 million viewers, the most-watched TV movie in six years.
- Post wire services
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