“The Handmaid’s Tale” creator and showrunner is bringing another woman-penned novel to the small screen. Bruce Miller will develop and produce a series adaptation of “These Women,” Ivy Pochoda’s new novel. MGM/UA Television snagged rights to the book, which hit shelves yesterday, “in a competitive situation.” Deadline broke the news.
Described as “a serial killer story like you’ve never seen before – a literary thriller of female empowerment and social change,” “These Women” is set in West Adams, “a rapidly changing part of South Los Angeles.” The story “focuses on five very different women whose lives are steeped in danger and anguish. They’re connected by one man and his deadly obsession, though not all of them know that yet,” the source hints. “There’s Dorian, still adrift after her daughter’s murder remains unsolved; Julianna, a young dancer nicknamed Jujubee, who lives hard and fast, resisting anyone trying to slow her down; Essie, a brilliant vice cop who sees a crime pattern emerging where no one else does; Marella, a daring performance artist whose work has long pushed boundaries but now puts her in peril; and Anneke, a quiet woman who has turned a willfully blind eye to those around her for far too long. The careful existence they have built for themselves starts to crumble when two murders rock their neighborhood.”
“The idea [for ‘These Women’] appeared to me all at once when I watched a documentary about a serial killer in South LA,” Pochoda told The Rumpus. “You could say that my book is slightly based on it. It’s called ‘Tales of the Grim Sleeper.’ The filmmakers were interviewing the killer’s friends, and they were saying the traditional stuff, like he was the nicest guy. But then halfway through the interview one of the friends just said, ‘Well, there were always pictures of naked women in his car, and he had all this rope there. And sometimes we’d go to his house, and there was screaming in the back.’ And I was like, wait, you knew? Then, in a book about Ted Bundy, I read about his girlfriend calling the police, turning him in, and them being like, oh, it’s not him. I asked myself, how do you live with the idea that your boyfriend or husband might be a serial killer? I was very interested in that,” she explained, “and I thought this could be a feminist story about what it’s like not to be taken seriously because you’re a woman, about there being double standards.”
Miller, who has won two Emmy Awards for writing and exec producing Margaret Atwood adaptation “The Handmaid’s Tale,” will oversee the project and “bring in a writer to pen the adaptation.”
Set to return for a fourth season on Hulu, “The Handmaid’s Tale” is led by Elisabeth Moss. So far, every season of the dystopian drama has boasted a higher-than-average number of women directors and writers. Reed Morano won an Emmy for directing the pilot, making her the first woman to take home the honor for directing a drama series since Mimi Leder landed the prize for “ER” in 1995.
Pochoda’s other novels include “Wonder Valley” and “Visitation Street.”
