The Gotham Group has optioned the rights to biography SECRET IDENTITY: THE FETISH ART OF SUPERMAN'S CO-CREATOR JOE SHUSTER by Craig Yoe, per VARIETY.
The move comes just days after the heirs of Superman co-creator Jerome Siegel lost a lawsuit against Warner Bros. Yoe's book was published earlier this year by Abrams ComicArts.
Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, Lee Stollman and Julie Kane-Ritsch are producing, and are looking for writers. The novel reveals Shuster as the secret artist behind THE NIGHTS OF HORROR, a 16-volume series of mob-financed underground comics that depicted S&M and brutal torture. Sold covertly under the counters in Time Square bookstores, they sparked a police crackdown, several sensational trials and a Supreme Court censorship case in 1954.
A group called the Brooklyn Thrill Killers used the comics as inspiration for a crime spree, leading to the crackdown.
Yoe is a comic archivist who came across the comic at an estate sale and recognized Shuster's stylistic signature. His book does not discuss how the late artist felt about the scandal, and the film will use the crime spree and the artist as the backdrop to a period drama.
"Some people felt that when I discovered these books, I should have buried them in the back yard," Yoe said. "To me, it's part of his legacy, the idea that in addition to the great character of Superman, he had this whole different side to him, and did brilliant work, in secret."
