Dawn French's book 'A Tiny Bit Marvelous' is to be adapted for a new ITV series.
Dawn French
Twins Emma and Beth Kilcoyne - who developed Dawn's 2010 drama 'Roger & Val Have Just Got In' - are tasked with the job of reworking the 2011 tome about a debilitated family.
A source told the Daily Mirror newspaper: "Dawn loved working with the twins so much on 'Roger and Val she thought of them straight away when adapting her debut novel into a series."
However, those expecting the 59-year-old 'Vicar of Dibley' actress to take on the lead role of mother Mo Battle may be disappointed as she has reportedly decided to not to take on the part because she feels she is too old.
But she could still appear in the show in some capacity.
The insider added: "Dawn believes she's now too old at 59 to play the mother character."
The series is to be commissioned by ITV chief Polly Hill within the next few weeks.
The story follows Mo and her teenage daughter Dora, who feels like a "big fat loser" and her younger sibling, who suffers an identity crisis and wants to be called Oscar after the famous poet Oscar Wilde instead of Peter.
Dawn - who divorced her husband Sir Lenny Henry in 2010 - previously said she wanted to put out a series about marriage because most TV shows don't portray marital relationships as she knows them.
On putting out 'Roger & Val', she previously said: "I was part of a very successful marriage for a long time
"For much longer than I wasn't, if you see what I mean. For most of my life, in fact. So definitely I had no worries about [portraying a marriage on screen]. In fact that was one of the reasons I wanted to do it. Because most of the television I see that represents marriage isn't what I know to be marriage. Except for something like 'Outnumbered', which is more real."
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