Penelope Cruz and British veteran actor Sir Ben Kingsley are to star in a big-screen adaptation of the steamy Philip Roth novella “Dying Animal”, it was reported Wednesday.

Cruz, nominated at last month’s Oscars for her performance in “Volver”, will join Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson in the film, which will begin shooting in Vancouver next month, Variety reported.

The film tells the story of a student who engages in a torrid affair with her professor and then returns to confront him years later.

Tom Rosenberg, of producers Lakeshore, said the company had made adapting Roth’s works for cinema a priority.

“He’s one of the great American writers, and this one is squarely an adult story, with the kind of erotic scenes that hark back to the films of the 1970s,” Rosenberg told Variety.