Savage attack on all-girl Lord of the Flies idea

HOLLYWOOD is to adapt Lord of the Flies with an all-girl cast in a gender swap that has dismayed fans of the original novel.

William Golding’s novel, published in 1954, put a group of British boys on an uninhabited island and charted their descent into savagery. He believed that the story would not work with girls. But the makers of the new Warner Bros film insist it will be “a very faithful contemporised adaptation of the book”. David Siegel, the director and screenwriter, said the themes were applicable to either sex.

However, on social media, the reaction was withering. Roxane Gay, the feminist commentator, wrote: “An allwomen remake makes no sense because the plot of that book wouldn’t happen with all women.” Others said the point of the story was to illustrate “toxic masculinity”, and joked that the new plot would be: “Girls get marooned on an island. Band together to find food, shelter, rescue. Nobody dies. The end.”