Szabo opens 'Door' to next project

Director to bring novel to bigscreen

By JOHN NADLER

BUDAPEST -- Helmer Istvan Szabo's next project will be "The Door," about a woman novelist and her enigmatic housekeeper, based on the novel of the same name by Hungarian Magda Szabo.

The German-French-Hungarian production will begin shooting in fall 2009 after the Hungarian-born Szabo completes "Utas es holdvilag," which is now in production.

Jeno Habermann, of FilmArt Studio, will co-produce "The Door" with Sandor Soeth of Germany's Inuit Pictures. The budget and cast have not been announced.

The novel, translated into 36 languages, won France's Femina literary prize in 2003. The author, who died in November, is considered one of Hungary's foremost femme scribes and is no relation to the helmer.