Gael García Bernal has signed on to star in The Daily Show host Jon Stewart's directorial debut, Rosewater. We first reported on the project back in March, when it was announced that Jon Stewart is taking a 12-week hiatus from The Daily Show to make his first feature.

Jon Stewart wrote the screenplay, which was adapted from Maziar Bahari's 2011 book Then They Came For Me: A Family's Story of Love, Captivity and Survival. The book recounts the author/journalist's time in Iran, where he was supposed to go for one week to cover the country's national elections. Instead, he was held in an Iranian prison for 118 days, tortured and interrogated by a mysterious man who the writer described as smelling of rosewater. Gael García Bernal will play the reporter, who left his pregnant fiancee behind in London for what he thought was a routine assigment.

Scott Rudin is producing with Gigi Pritzker, whose OddLot Entertainment company is financing the adaptation. Production is scheduled to begin later this summer.

Gael García Bernal most recently starred in Pablo Larraín's No, and will next be seen in

Dallas Buyers Club later this year.