Dustin Hoffman will star in Informant Media’s drama alongside Alfred Molina and Kathy Bates. Embankment Films handles international sales and will introduce at AFM next week.

Judy Cairo, Carol Baum and Jane Goldenring are producing Boychoir, scheduled to start principal photography in February in Connecticut and New York.

Francois Girard of The Red Violin fame will direct from Ben Ripley’s screenplay about a stern choirmaster who locks horns with a talented youngster from the wrong side of the tracks.

The producers are conducting a global search for a young performer with dramatic and musical talent to play the lead. Singers from the renowned American Boychoir School will feature in the production.

Molina will play a teacher at the school and Bates will portray the headmistress. Informant Media’s Michael A Simpson and Eric Brenner are on the executive producer roster with Ripley.

“These boys’ voices soar with this rare, unearthly ability for only a few years of their young lives, then their voices transform, a gift seemingly lost,” said Girard.

“But what they experience in that brief time shapes them forever. It’s an emotional, unique story and I’m thrilled to tell it with Dustin Hoffman, Alfred Molina and Kathy Bates.”

Informant is in production on Kidnapping Freddy Heineken starring Jim Sturgess, Sam Worthington, Ryan Kwanten and Anthony Hopkins. Embankment is also selling that title at AFM.