According to Variety, Salma Hayek will star in Paradise, the four-hour telepic adaptation of the Toni Morrison novel for Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Films and ABC. Darnell Martin is adapting the novel and will direct. He most recently helmed TV movie Oprah Winfrey Presents: Their Eyes Were Watching God, which garnered an Emmy nomination for star Halle Berry.

Paradise revolves around the murder of numerous women by a group of black men in the town of Ruby, Okla.

Hayek, who began her career starring in the Mexican daytime soap Nuevo Amanecer, rarely does television anymore, though she did play Esmeralda in TNT's The Hunchback of Notre Dame and directed The Maldonado Miracle for Showtime.

She just wrapped three features: She stars with Colin Farrell in the Robert Towne-directed Ask the Dust; with Penelope Cruz in Bandidas for Fox; and with John Travolta and James Gandolfini in the indie Lonely Hearts.