2009: Catherine Hardwicke is set to direct the adaptation of Gayle Forman‘s young adult novel If I Stay.  2010: Hardwicke is out, Heitor Dhalia is in as director.  Dakota Fanning enters talks to star as Mia, an accomplished 17-year-old cellist destined for Julliard before a car accident sends her into a coma.  2013: Dhalia and Fanning are no longer on board.  Instead, Chloe Moretz is attached to star and RJ Cutler (Nashville) is in talks to direct his first narrative feature, according to Variety.

The book has a neat hook, using the out-of-body perspective and recollections of Mia while she’s in the coma.  I don’t know if this is the iteration that will push If I Stay out of development, but keep your eye out for more casting announcements soon—particularly the “punk rock boyfriend.”  Read the book synopsis after the jump.

NBC has brought Mena Suvari and Kyle Howard in to co-star in the untitled single-camera sitcom created by Hilary Winston (Community).  The story centers on “a shy, focused woman who, after being dumped by her fiance, leans on her co-workers to help her come out of her shell and plot her revenge.”  Suvari and Howard play two of the woman’s co-workers.  Suvari is described as a “hard partyer and unabashedly promiscuous.”  Howard is a former football player.

Hit the jump for more pilot casting news.

Director R.J. Cutler, who previously helmed the fashion-themed documentary The September Issue, will direct an adaptation of Lee Tulloch’s novel Fabulous Nobodies. The book is “a social satire set in the 1980’s downtown club scene of New York, where a group of people lived and breathed fashion until it took over the world.”

Deadline reports that Mark Fortin and Josh Miller will write the screenplay, with Gail Lyon (Erin Brockovich), Julie Anne Quay (former executive editor of V magazine) and Cutler himself producing. Cutler’s no stranger to fashion, as The September Issue followed Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour as she prepared for her magazine’s fall fashion issue. No word on distribution or casting at the moment. Hit the jump for a synopsis of the book.

As I sit here in my blue jeans and Catholic University sweatshirt, really as about as glamorous as I ever get, I can’t help but wonder how in the world I ended up reviewing a documentary about the inner workings of U.S. Vogue.

For anyone who doesn’t know, The September Issue is a behind-the-scenes look at all the work that goes into producing the magazine’s biggest annual issue, which clocks in at a rather amazing 800+ pages, and its stars are Vogue editor in chief Anna Wintour and creative director Grace Coddington. And though it could have easily turned into a vanity piece designed to refute the fictionalized portrait of Wintour in The Devil Wears Prada, it’s instead an engaging portrait of the creative process.

Hit the jump for a full review of the double-disc DVD release of The September Issue.