Paul Rainey’s ‘Why Don’t You Love Me?’ Optioned By A24; Jennifer Lawrence To Star
by Richard Bruton
Great news for a great Brit comics maker: Paul B. Rainey‘s Why Don’t You Love Me? has been optioned for a movie staring Jennifer Lawrence.
.Well, this really couldn’t have happened to both a nicer guy and a better book. Paul Rainey’s been a mainstay of Brit comics for decades, getting better and better and better over the years until publishing not one, but two magnum opuses (or indeed magnum opera – another plural form that’s just perfect) – There’s No Time Like The Present (2015, Escape Books) and Why Don’t You Love Me? (2023, Drawn & Quarterly).
Now comes the news that Why Don’t You Love Me? has been optioned by A24 for a movie with Jennifer Lawrence set to star and produce. Variety had the story here.
I’ve told you plenty about both Rainey and Why Don’t You Love Me? here at Comicon, most recently with the news that both There’s No Time Like The Present and Why Don’t You Love Me? will be reprinted in paperback by Drawn & Quarterly in 2025 – why, it’s almost as though they had an inkling of the news!
.Here’s what Paul had to say…
‘Not a dream! Not a hoax! Not a mental breakdown! A24 have optioned the rights to Why Don’t You Love Me? with plans to develop my graphic novel for film! Jennifer Lawrence is set to star. She is also set to produce with Ari Aster.
‘I’ve known about this for over a year which, if I have seen you out and about, you will know. If I haven’t told you, it’ll be because I’ve not seen you in the flesh and I’ve been superstitious about putting any of it into writing in case it got leaked online. If I did tell you before now, and let’s face it, I told everyone, including the assistant to the doctor who performed a biopsy on my tongue, who then asked if I could get her son work experience on set, (I told her that I don’t have that type of influence), thank you for not sharing it on social media. I’m assuming it’s because you’re discrete and not because you didn’t believe me. If I didn’t tell you, it’s because I haven’t seen you recently (or I forgot). Sorry. I really wanted to tell you all about it. I really did. Anyway, the cat is out of the bag now, thank God.
‘Soon after the book was published last year, I started to receive emails from film studios which I forwarded to my agent. (Yes, I have an agent). I presumed that they were just phishing for IPs, but within a couple of weeks I was meeting with three of them along with another interested director. Soon after, their offers started to arrive. This back and forth between us went on for a few weeks until, eventually, we decided to go with A24.
‘I’m delighted to be able to share this news with you at last. Watch this space, I guess.’
My first brush with Why Don’t You Love Me? was when Paul serialised it as a webcomic, right after it had been serialised in David Lloyd‘s Aces Weekly digital anthology. I featured it as part of webcomic weekly here in 2022 before reviewing the beautifully put together hardback from D&Q here, exactly one year later to the day in 2023.
Here’s a little of what I had to say at the time…
‘It’s all about our nice little surburban couple, Claire and Mark, and their two kids. They’re dealing with all the normal modern life things, the troubles with parenting, things with schools, work, their relationship. Except that’s not true. It’s far from a normal little family unit. Claire’s obviously depressed, retreating into the bottle, and Mark’s obviously got his own problems – forgetting the kids’ names being only the start of it.
‘There’s such a brilliance with how Rainey sets it all up – no huge revelations await you, certainly not in the first half of the book, just that deliciously slow and steady unfolding of an unsettling feeling in front of you as Rainey details their hum-drum lives, and does it so very well.
‘It’s quite magnificent to see just how Rainey spins it all out, with an unsettling feel creeping in early on and simply refusing to stop nagging at you. There’s the constant feeling that something could go very, very, very wrong. And then it does…’