Sony Pictures has set Josh Boone to direct the film adaptation of Lynn Painter's bestselling YA novel Fake Skating, with a release date claimed for 16 July 2027, according to Deadline.

The studio greenlit the project the week before the exclusive report, making it an active production with no cast yet attached. Boone's hiring is the first major creative move since Sony came onto the film in March 2026.

For book-to-screen adaptations, the director pick is often the whole ballgame. Boone steered The Fault in Our Stars — the 2014 cancer-romance weepie that turned John Green's novel into a global box-office hit — and most recently directed Regretting You, based on Colleen Hoover's bestseller. He is a director studios trust with emotionally charged young-adult material, and Fake Skating sits squarely in that lane.

The novel is described as a high school hockey romance about childhood sweethearts whose icy reunion thaws when they fake a romantic relationship. Painter's book has been a phenomenon by any measure: more than 200,000 copies in print, translated into 16 languages, and a winner of the 2025 Goodreads Choice Award. It has appeared on the New York Times YA Hardcover Bestseller list every single week since its release in September 2025, holding the #1 position for 15 of those weeks. It is the first of Painter's novels to be adapted for the screen.

The screenplay comes from Morgan Lehmann and Victoria Bata, with revisions by Boone and his writing partner Knate Lee. Bata's credits include Hulu's Tell Me Lies and the upcoming film Watch Dogs, giving the project writers with both streaming and feature experience.

Will Gluck and Jacqueline Monetta are producing through Olive Bridge Entertainment, the production company that developed the project alongside Sony. Madison Jones and author Lynn Painter serve as executive producers, keeping the novelist closely tied to the adaptation.

Sony's 16 July 2027 date plants Fake Skating firmly in the summer corridor — the window where studios slot films they believe can draw young audiences during school holidays. It is a competitive space, and the date gives the project roughly a year from now to assemble a cast and begin production.

No actors are attached yet. With Boone now in the director's chair and a bestseller's worth of built-in readership, the next announcement to watch will be casting.