Uma Thurman is Pattinson’s “Bel Ami”

Uma Thurman and Robert Pattinson will use each other in “Bel Ami.”

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Uma Thurman has been cast in “Bel Ami,” the adaptation of Guy de Maupassant’s 1885 novel (and that’s novel, not short story as THR says; people keep making this mistake any time there is an article about this movie, and it’s really sad. What does it take, thirty seconds to look this up and find about a million non-Wikipedia sources? Come on, everyone, just try a little bit more).The reason this is news right now has, alas, less to do with the lovely and talented Ms. Thurman–who does, indeed, grow lovelier and more skilled with time–than with her co-star, Robert Pattinson. You may have heard of him. He’s starring in a little movie called “New Moon” this weekend.

In “Bel Ami,” Pattinson will play Georges Duroy, a lowly young journalist who rises to the top of Parisian society by sleeping with a series of wealthy, older women. Thurman plays one of his targets but one who eventually becomes his wife. Kristin Scott Thomas has also joined the cast as another of Duroy’s steps on the road to the top.

Theater director Declan Donnellan will make his film debut with “Bel Ami.” It’s set to start shooting next year in Paris. Presumably they’re working around Pattinson’s “Twilight” commitments; he’s the one who’s driving this bus, after all.