Adam Brody Cast In Whit Stillman's 'Damsels In Distress,' Greta Gerwig Confirmed

When we first heard about Damsels in Distress, the first film from director Whit Stillman in many years, it was described as a super-low budget indie with no stars. Then, not long ago, Greta Gerwig revealed that she had joined the cast. Not a star, but hardly an unknown. Now Adam Brody has signed on, and we've learned the film is backed by Castle Rock. Oh, how things change.

THR confirms Greta Gerwig's casting (as if that was necessary, given that the actress announced it herself) and says that Adam Brody is also starring in the Castle Rock project. The trade's synopsis goes as follows:

The movie revolves around a group of style-obsessed college girls who take in a new student (Gerwig) and teach her their misguided ways of helping people at their grungy university, sort of "Mean Girls" filtered through the lens of the filmmaker behind such urbane indie dramas as "Barcelona," "Metropolitan" and "Disco." The crux of the story is focused on the relationship between Gerwig's character and a suitor (Brody), whom the girls are taken with but have doubts over his intentions.

Add to that the previous statement from Ms. Gerwig about her character:

I play a girl named Violet who runs a suicide-prevention center at a liberal arts college. She prevents suicides through the powers of Thirties song-and-dance numbers. So it's a very dark comedy.

So the dance numbers are part of the 'misguided efforts?' That's pretty much it, and this all goes together with the early synopsis we heard. I won't reiterate that here, as it is pretty much identical to everything above. And if Castle Rock is now backing the film, I wonder what that means for both the production design of the musical numbers, and the production's clout when it comes to licensing songs.

The film is shooting now.