The Concord Bookshop in Concord, Mass., was the first to report on Facebook that a new bookstore has magically sprung up down the street, which looks a lot like a branch of Farmington, Maine’s Devaney, Doak, & Garrett Booksellers. If the two stores look similar, that’s because they are. The DDG outlet in Maine inspired the movie, Tumbledown, that is filming in Massachusetts and the crew remade Concord''s French Lessons Boutique to resemble DDG. The screenplay was written by Desiree Van Til, who worked at DDG during her high school years in the mid-1990s. Her husband, Sean Mewshaw, son of writer Michael Mewshaw, is directing.
The romantic comedy stars Jason Sudeikis as Andrew, a New York writer who comes to rural Maine to research the former husband of widow Hannah (Rebecca Hall). Griffin Dunne plays Upton, a character based on DDG’s real-life owner Kenny Brechner. When the film comes out, no date is set yet, watch closely for Brechner’s photo on the back of a fictitious book that he is purported to have written.
“It’s cool,” Brechner told PW. “I’m happy for Desi that [the film] is finally getting done. The bookstore element is based on her time here. The rest of the film may have a bit of interest, too, perhaps. It's a great script.” He warns other booksellers that “there’s some pretty questionable handselling” in the movie. He wanted Desi to put up a sign: “No customers were harmed in the filming of this movie.” As for the name of the film, it’s from Maine’s Tumbledown Mountain.
