Spain's El Deseo is preppinga new English-language drama from director Isabel Coixet for an autumn shootprior to cranking up Pedro Almodovar's as-yet undecided next film in 2005.

Almodovar, whose latestfeature, Bad Education (Mala Educacion) inaugurates Cannes, has threescripts in development, according to producer Agustin Almodovar. The directoraverages one film every two years.

The new projects include thelong-gestating noir thriller Tarantula and two female-centeredcomedies: Los Amantes Pasajeros(Transient Lovers) and La Abuela Fantasma (Ghost Grandmother). Allare Spanish-language.

"Pedro works his scriptsthoroughly -there's no doubt these projects will mature but we still don't knowwhich will get there first," theproducer says. Tarantula, a book adaptation in which both Penelope Cruzand Antonio Banderas have expressed interest, is the least developed of thethree.

The producer compares Lovers(formerly Women And Airports) to the screwball comedy of Women On TheVerge Of A Nervous Breakdown, while the multi-generational Grandmotherhas more in common with the family/village aesthetic of The Flower Of MySecret.

Coixet's new film, titled TheSecret Life Of Words, is a drama about a woman living in a world of menaboard an oil platform in the North Sea. It will be set and filmed in Europe,unlike her well-received My Life Without Me, which shot in Canada. Wordswill have a mixed Anglo/European cast likely led by My Life star SarahPolley.