Will Anne Hathaway be making bubble gum from scratch? Maybe. According to Deadline, Hathaway will star in and produce an upcoming “trad wife” thriller based on Cairo Claire Burke’s forthcoming novel, Yesteryear. After a battle for its rights, Amazon MGM Studios secured the rights to turn the genre-bending novel into a film. The novel’s official synopsis reads:
“Natalie, lives a traditional lifestyle – and has the Instagram account to prove it. Her charming farmhouse on her working ranch is artfully cluttered, her husband is a handsome cowboy, her homemade sourdough boules are each more beautiful than the last. So what if there are nannies and producers and industrial-grade ovens behind the scenes?
What Natalie’s followers don’t know won’t hurt them. Then, one morning, Natalie wakes up in a strange, horrible version of reality. Her daughter informs her that the year is 1805. Is this a hoax? A reality show? A test from God? One thing Natalie does know is that it’ll make one hell of an Instagram post.”
Through social media, author Burke shared that the upcoming film is “the most thrilling news” and commended Hathaway, sharing that their conversation was “was one of the most creatively electric moments” of her life.
“When I got off the call, I told my husband that if she wasn’t an actress, she probably would’ve become a rocket scientist – but I’m so grateful she chose the path she did, because now I get the opportunity to watch her (and the brilliant team of women at Amazon) turn my novel into a genre-defying, neck-breaking, breath-snatching cinematic thrill of an adaptation. I feel privileged beyond words. I can’t wait to see what she does with Natalie – and trust me when I say you can’t either,” Burke shared on Instagram.
Hathaway will produce the film under Somewhere Pictures banner alongside Guymon Casady, Suzan Bymel and Alexandra Holcomb of Entertainment 360. Burke’s work has appeared in The Atlantic, Bustle, and Marie Claire. Burke has an ongoing short story project, Cover Stories, and is an editor with Katie Couric Media.
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The Trad Wife Conundrum
Burke previously described Yesteryear as capturing “the maddening contradictions of modern womanhood,” a topic that audiences witnessed in Barbie (and, of course, many other films). But it’s a topic we can’t wait to see explored through the “trad wife” lens. Love it or hate it, the “trad wife” trend, while not new, is exploding on social media platforms, thanks to influencers like Estee Williams, Nara Smith, and Ballerina Farm (Hannah Neeleman). These popular “trad wives” (self-proclaimed or assumed) showcase their lives as traditional homemakers, often sharing laborious, from-scratch recipes for items like cereal, Coca-Cola, and sunscreen.
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What defines a “trad wife” is open to interpretation, but generally, it refers to women who embrace conventional gender roles within their relationships. During the last year, the “trad wife” aesthetic has become a cultural phenomenon, and it was only a matter of time before Hollywood dove straight into the topic with a feature film. Media attention has already amplified the trend (sparking both criticism and approval), and a Hathaway-led film will surely fuel the fire. We can’t wait to see what type of commentary Burke’s Yesteryear delivers on traditional domesticity and gender roles… and who gets angry in the process.