Jack Evans, a journalist and screenwriter who worked during his teens as a guide in Tanzania, has been fascinated by mythologies, the wilderness, and literature from an early age. He was only 13 when he first read "Far Tortuga," Peter Matthiessen's 1975 novel about subsistence turtle fishermen off Central America's Mosquito Coast -- "the most visually enthralling novel I'd ever read."
Matthiessen's work helped "set me on my own career path of working in conservation in East Africa and working in journalism," Mr. Evans said in a phone call last week. "He was a big inspiration."
"Adapting 'Far Tortuga': The Making of an Ecological Thriller Film in the Footsteps of Peter Matthiessen" will bring Mr. Evans to The Church in Sag Harbor on Sunday at 6 p.m. for a talk, a screening of the trailer, and a theatrical performance and live reading.
When Mr. Evans pivoted from journalism to screenwriting several years ago, he knew that while there had been attempts in Hollywood to adapt "Far Tortuga," none had come to fruition, perhaps because the story was ahead of its time.
"Being a novel about underrepresented peoples, about an ecological crisis, about uncertain spirituality, I found it to be very relevant to today, almost as if the times have caught up with the themes of the novel."
Once he decided he wanted to adapt the book, Mr. Evans formed a production company with a few family members and friends and bought the rights to the novel from the writer's family.
Before the novel was published, Matthiessen had written in The New Yorker about his experience with the turtle fishermen. That article, "a sort of expedition report, became essential for us," Mr. Evans said, "because it's a map to all of the true characters" Matthiessen encountered.
Because of that article, when Mr. Evans went to Grand Cayman at the start of the project, he was able to find descendants of and stories about the people Matthiessen sailed with. "I talked to old turtling captains in their 90s who confirmed character details and certain metaphors that Matthiessen made." He also consulted the writer's notes in his papers at the University of Texas at Austin.
Then, "because it's hard to call yourself a filmmaker until you make a film," he and his team went to Belize and made "Eden River," a short film he called "sort of an original prequel" to the world of "Far Tortuga." "Eden River" has won a dozen awards at festivals.
Now, he said, "We're trying to make the most out of very little and trusting that keeping the story on the ground and staying close to the water, being in the real places with the real people, will make a film that's original."
The Peter Matthiessen Center called Mr. Evans in April. "I came out to the Hamptons and we met, and now they're kind of throwing their weight behind the film," he said. Sunday's program at The Church "will bring the story to the author's home town in a big way."
Mr. Evans will formally announce the feature film adaptation of the novel, present a trailer, and discuss the anthropological value of both book and film. Because he wanted to showcase the "intriguingly subtle, loaded dialogue" that runs through both, two New York actors of Caribbean descent who appeared in "Eden River" will give a live performance from the script. A reception will follow.
It was his relationship with Cormac McCarthy that led Mr. Evans to screenwriting. "I met him when I was 8 years old, because we're both from Knoxville. We began to have long conversations about writing that showed me what I was meant to do maybe years before I could have figured it out for myself."
It was the opportunity to adapt one of McCarthy's books "that put me in the realm of filmmaking," he added. But that's another story.
Tickets to Sunday's program are $10, free for members of The Church, who are required to R.S.V.P. on the website.
