Martin Scorsese, “Hoops Dreams” director Steve James, and screenwriter Steven Zillian (of Schindler’s List and Gangs of New York fame) have teamed up for what could be the most touching film about film of all time: a Roger Ebert biopic based on the movie critic’s memoir, “Life Itself." Ebert vows he’ll remain hands-off, allowing the all-star development team to craft a take on his life, which includes a bout with alcoholism, a legendary pairing with Gene Siskel, and inspiringly honest writing on the jaw-cancer surgery that left him unable to speak. We’re pretty sure it'll be worthy of his myriad finest moments. [via the Sun-Times]

When former Lehman Brothers trader Jared Dillian’s memoir "Street Freak" was published last year, Bloomberg News anointed it the “best business book of 2011.” Its release in paperback today makes it even more compulsively readable. Mental illness is now a standard metaphor for how Wall Street firms transformed the early crisis of 9/11 into the global meltdown of 2008, and Dillian gives us a double dose of it: His bipolar and obsessive compulsive disorders are the perfect match for the world he stepped into as a cheap-suited, ex-military-man working as a trading floor door-checker and walked out of an ETF trader a few years later when the firm collapsed. Add to it all his ability to turn complicated financial jargon into page-turning narrative, and voila: the perfect insider voice for the rest of us. [via Blogcritics.com]

John Cheever and Richard Yates biographer Blake Bailey has secured Philip Roth‘s cooperation in what will be his first living subject coverage. No publisher has yet been named in this partnership between the two memoir heavies: Roth, whose fiction is largely autobiographical, has also written two bona fide memoirs, and Bailey will publish his own next year. Bailey’s sack of prizes includes a Guggenheim Fellowship and the National Books Critics Circle award, but only a nomination for the Pulitzer prize. His Roth-based tale may just be the one that lands him the big one. [via the New York Times]

In the too-soon? department, talks are now in progress for a Joe Paterno biopic -- and they include Al Pacino, who will take on the leading role. The film will be based on Joe Posnanski’s biography, "Paterno," which debuted in the first spot on the New York Times bestseller list this August. No word yet on who will play the man who embodies the worst personnel mistake the legendary Penn State coach ever made: Jerry Sandusky. [via CelebBuzz.com]

Sixteen-year-old Olympic sensation Gabby Douglas is writing a memoir that will begin with her leaving home when she was twelve to train for the Olympics -- a journey that culminated this August in two gold medals and a status of first African-American woman to win the all-around gymnastics title. Due out in December, the heart-capturing gymnast’s latest project will fulfill another yet one of her dreams: she says she’s always wanted to write a book. [via New York Daily News]