Adaptations of Best-selling novels are like catnip to studios, filmmakers and TV networks, and Nathan Hill's first book, The Nix has scored quite the team to bring it to life. Meryl Streep is on board to star for producer/director J.J. Abrams and the series will be shopped around various channels and streaming services.
We'd expect healthy bidding for this one, which will use Hill's novel as a jumping-off point. The book's title, despite being partially set in 1968, doesn't refer to Richard Nixon. Instead, drawn from Norwegian folklore, it's a mysterious spirit and in the book, anything you love that one day disappears, taking with it a piece of your heart. For Samuel Andersen-Anderson in 2011, his nix is his mother, Fay, who abandoned the family when he was a boy. Years later, she’s re-appeared, having thrown rocks at a conservative governor who is out on the presidential campaign trail. The media paints Faye as a radical hippie with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother was an ordinary girl who married her high-school sweetheart. Which version of his mother is true? Two facts are certain: she’s facing some serious charges, and she needs Samuel’s help.
Abrams' Bad Robot company is attached to produce the eventual show, in whatever form it takes for Warner Bros. TV. He'll also likely be involved as a director. Streep was last on our screens in Florence Foster Jenkins and is attached to co-star in Mary Poppins Returns. Abrams is the executive producer behind HBO's new Westworld series, which hits Sky Atlantic next month.