For anyone paying attention, the record for the longest time between the release date of a Michael Douglas film (1987’s Wall Street) and that of its sequel (2010’s Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps) may soon be broken.  According to Variety, who broke the story, screenwriter Alex McAulay has accepted the job to adapt the script from Warren Adler’s The War of the Roses: The Children, the sequel to The War of the Roses.  The first book was adapted into the 1989 dark comedy starring Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito (who also directed the film).

The original film, generally well received by critics at the time, concerned a comically bitter divorce battle between Barbara and Jonathan Rose, and it was as close to an actual “war” between two people as one can imagine.  In the sequel, the scars the children experienced from their parents’ feud carries over in their adult lives.  Josh Rose goes through his own virulent divorce that begins with a petty skirmish over missing Milky Way bars while Evie Rose struggles with (according to the book’s synopsis from Adler’s website) a “‘food-is-love’ obsession.”  Meanwhile, Josh’s children try to deal with the pain of their parents’ divorce as they fight to keep their family together.

Alex McAulay is a relative newcomer to screenwriting, though Variety reports that he has contributed to episodes of HBO’s Eastbound and Down and has penned four novels.  His Black List screenplay Flower is also reportedly being produced by Rough House Pictures, the production company headed by Danny McBride, David Gordon Green, and Jody Hill.

The film adaptation of The War of the Roses: The Children is still in infancy; though David Permut (Youth in Revolt, Face/Off) of Permut Presentations is producing with Jonathan Adler and Stephen Greenwald of Grey Eagle Films, the film is currently without a director and a scheduled release date.  In the meantime, check out the old trailer to the first film for an idea of what the sequel may offer.