Judy Blume Celebrates ‘Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret’ Movie Premiere in Los Angeles

variety.com:

Carla Renata Judy Blume is having a major moment. Not only did Prime Video just release a documentary about her life, “Judy Blume Forever,” but Hulu recently also announced it’s turning her book, “Summer Sisters,” into a limited series.

And on April 28, a film adaptation of “Are you There God? It’s Me, Margaret?” will be in theaters. “I needed to read everything she ever wrote because she just wrote the truth about what it felt like to be that age,” the film’s director Kelly Fremon Craig told Variety at the movie’s Los Angeles premiere on Saturday.

Craig wrote a letter to Blume asking to adapt the YA novel. The author was already a fan of Craig’s “The Edge of Seventeen.” “I knew she was the right one.

I couldn’t be happier. I may be the only book writer who has ever said that the movie is better than my book, and I mean it,” said Blume, who was recently honored by Variety at its Power of Women luncheon. “This wonderful group has given me the gift of lifetime.” Since its release, the book has inspired truthful conversations about puberty. “I love how normal puberty was talked about and even though reading it sometimes you’re like, ‘Oh, gross,’ I think it just normalized the middle school experience,” said Elle Graham, who plays Nancy.