Sky has announced that Josh Hartnett (Penny Dreadful) is set to lead the cast of The Fear Index, a four-part limited series adaptation of the bestselling novel by Robert Harris.
Adapted by Paul Andrew Williams and Caroline Bartleet, and directed by David Caffrey (The Alienist, Peaky Blinders), the four-part limited series will see Hartnett joined by Leila Farzad (I Hate Suzie), Arsher Ali (The Ritual) and Grégory Montel (Call My Agent). The official synopsis for the series reads:
Josh Hartnett will star as Dr Alex Hoffman, a computer scientist and genius who is ready to make a killing. Alongside his Hedge Fund business partner and best friend, Hugo (Ali), he’s launching VIXAL-4 to investors – an AI-driven system that exploits fear in the financial markets and operates at lightning speed to make big returns. The promise is billions, the rich are ready to get richer… but this is not the day Alex and Hugo had planned on. What follows is a fast-paced journey through the worst 24 hours of Alex’s life – cutting across reality, memory and paranoid fantasy, forcing him to question everything he sees with his own eyes.
In the pulse of Geneva’s financial district, Alex’s sanity is shaken after he is viciously attacked at his home by a man who knows all of his security codes. After more unexplained occurrences, Alex becomes convinced he’s being framed. But as secrets surface from his past, will anyone believe that he isn’t just losing his mind? Detective Leclerc (Montel), assigned to the case, struggles to work this former CERN scientist out, Hoffman’s talented artist wife, Gabby (Farzad) might just be losing patience this time, whilst Hugo’s only concern is the billion-dollar business on the line. Invention can be lonely, and in a modern world of AI, capitalism and technological breakthroughs, Dr Alex Hoffman might have to learn the hard way that it’s not always easy to foresee how destruction evolves from creation.
The Fear Index is set to begin filming in Hungary this month and will air on Sky Atlantic and NOW TV later this year.
