A bit of literary history: Robert Coover and the Origins of the Brunists - the (non) movie

Glad to see (very) short story by old friend Robert Coover in current New Yorker and to see in the notes on contributors that his forthcoming novel will be a long-anticipated follow-up to his first (great) novel from ca 1966, The Origin of the Brunists. Thought I'd use today's post add a bit to literary history with some info for current or future Coover fans, followers, and critics. In about 1985, lifelong friend and sometime writing collaborator Andy Wolk and I purchased from Coover the movie rights to Brunists. Apparently, we were the 2nd to do so; not sure how far along the first project moved, but was clearly never filmed. Andy and I had been fans of the novel since its initial publication. When we met with Coover to discuss terms, all went very well except for one sticking point: Bob (as we knew him) was very distressed about standard contract language that would sell the rights to all characters and sequels. He felt very strongly that he owned these characters and could not give them up - it was kind of touching. He also said he was planning a sequel. Oh? About what? Well, he was going to write about the Brunists, scattered after the end-of-the-world fiasco, travling the country in small groups, spreading the gospel, facing persecution, etc. Well, Andy and I immediately knew that, if we ever turned Brunists into a movie, the studio would not want that kind of sequel - it would be something like Tiger Miller gets a call from his friend who runs a weekly in Greenwich Village and needs his help on some breaking story .... After much discussion, we drew up a unique (I think) contract that said that on any sequel Coover would be hired as an executive story consultant, or some such title - we knew that provision could still be trouble but we figured we could work that out down the road. Anyway, sadly, though I produced an unworkable draft, we never did complete or sell a screenplay - one well-known producer was highly interested but he literally died on the set of movie he was in the midst of shooting - but that's another story. Now, it's cool to see that Coover's sequel is about to be published - and I suspect few know how long he has pondered and maybe worked on this project.