IN a departure from its usual made-for-TV movies about the rich and infamous, HBO is developing a movie about a homeless person.

The movie will be based on a book by British author Alexander Masters called “Stuart: A Life Backwards,” a biography of a troubled homeless man Masters befriended.

As in the book, the movie will tell the story of Stuart Shorter in reverse, starting with his death and going back over his adulthood and childhood.

An HBO spokesman confirmed the pay-cable channel has optioned the book and is developing a movie in conjunction with the BBC, which is handling the bulk of production.

No one has yet been cast in the role of Shorter.

Previous co-productions of HBO and the BBC include “Band of Brothers,” “Rome” and “The Gathering Storm.” “Storm,” which starred Albert Finney as Winston Churchill in the years before World War II, is more typical of HBO’s made-forTV movies, which in recent years have profiled Franklin Roosevelt (Kenneth Branagh in “Warm Springs”), Peter Sellers (Geoffrey Rush in “The Life and Death of Peter Sellers”) and Jean Harris (Annette Bening in “Mrs. Harris”).