Post gossip great-aunt Cindy Adams got the fresh dirt from Hollywood mega-producer Scott Rudin as to how, exactly, that crazy Oscar-nommed "No Country For Old Men" came to be. "Look, you never know when something great's going to come through the transom. I do movies, plays. I'm always looking. My office covers lots of material. I have people who read books and manuscripts all the time. There was no great aha! moment. This didn't come by wrapped in a big pink ribbon and ushered through with great fanfare from some superimportant VIP with a 'must read' sticker on it. The thing came to us simply. As an unpublished manuscript." Yes. A real Hollywood fairytale, optioning novels by world famous, award-winning, ICM-managed authors is. Then Rudin took a chance on a couple of complete unknowns from far away Minnesota named Joel and Ethan Coen, and the rest is history. (After the jump, for kicks, the Hollywood Reporter story announcing the NCFOM deal.) [NYP]

December 7, 2004 Tuesday

SOURCE: Online

BYLINE: Borys Kit

SECTION: NEWS; Film

LENGTH: 155 words

Scott Rudin will produce an adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's upcoming novel "No Country for Old Men" for Paramount Pictures. McCarthy is the critically acclaimed author of such Western-themed novels as "Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West" and the National Book Award-winning "All the Pretty Horses," which was adapted into a movie starring Matt Damon in 2000. "Old Men," a noir thriller set in West Texas, tells the blood-soaked tale of a man on the run with a suitcase full of money being pursued by a number of individuals. It is scheduled to hit bookshelves via Knopf in August. The prolific Rudin exec produced "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events," which opens Dec. 17. He also has been involved in "Team America: World Police," "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou," "Closer," "I ? Huckabees," "The Village," "The Manchurian Candidate" and "The Stepford Wives." McCarthy is repped by ICM.