Neil Gaiman’s novel Anansi Boys has been greenlit by Amazon Prime Video to be made into a series, the OTT platform announced in a press release on Wednesday.
The six-episode limited series will commence shooting in Scotland later this year at brand new studios and with “cutting-edge CGI technology.”
Anansi Boys was published in 2005 and is about “a dead god and his two sons, about birds and ghosts and beasts and cops, based in Caribbean and African tales,” as Gaiman puts it in his statement. The author added that the idea was conceived during a 1996 conversation he had with Sir Lenny Henry, who later narrated the audio book. It was Gaiman’s first number one New York Times Bestseller.
Henry and Gaiman will be part of the writing team of the upcoming series and will serve as executive producers on the show.
While the writing team includes Arvind Ethan David, Kara Smith, and Racheal Ofori, other executive producers on board are Douglas Mackinnon, Hanelle M Culpepper, Hilary Bevan Jones and Richard Fee.
Gaiman and Mackinnon, who are also collaborating on the second season of Good Omens, will serve as co-showrunners. Culpepper will direct the pilot. Jermain Julien (Grantchester) and Azhur Saleem (Doctor Who) are also directing for the series.
Gaiman further mentioned that a television adaptation of the fantasy novel has been on the cards for a long time. He revealed that he first began working on it a decade ago with Endor Productions and RED Production Company, which are now co-producing with Amazon Studios and The Blank Corporation.
As per the streaming giant’s synopsis, Anansi Boys follows Charlie Nancy, a young man who is used to being embarrassed by his estranged father. But when his father dies, Charlie discovers that his father was Anansi: trickster god of stories. And he learns that he has a brother, Spider, who is determined to make Charlie’s life more interesting but makes it a lot more dangerous.
While the cast has not been disclosed yet, the press release says the show will have a “suitably diverse cast and crew.”
This is Gaiman’s second series for Amazon Prime Video.
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In June, the platform announced the renewal of his show Good Omens for a second season. The fantasy series is based on the 1990 novel by the same name, authored by Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. It will be shot in Scotland as well.
In January, Gaiman announced a television adaptation of his comic book series The Sandman for Netflix. Originally published as a monthly comic, it became the first-ever comic book series to receive a literary award — the 1991 World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story. The dark fantasy revolves around the character named ‘King of Dream’ or ‘Morpheus’ and his siblings Destiny, Death, Desire, Despair, Delirium, and Destruction.