The BBC is set to bring Philip Pullman’s epic fantasy His Dark Materials to the small screen, with Variety reporting that BBC One has commissioned an initial eight-part series from New Line Cinema and Bad Wolf.
“It’s been a constant source of pleasure to me to see this story adapted to different forms and presented in different media. It’s been a radio play, a stage play, a film, an audiobook, a graphic novel — and now comes this version for television,” states Pullman. “In recent years we’ve seen how long stories on television, whether adaptations (Game of Thrones) or original (The Sopranos, The Wire), can reach depths of characterization and heights of suspense by taking the time for events to make their proper impact and for consequences to unravel. And the sheer talent now working in the world of long-form television is formidable. For all those reasons I’m delighted at the prospect of a television version of His Dark Materials. I’m especially pleased at the involvement of Jane Tranter, whose experience, imagination, and drive are second to none. As for the BBC, it has no stronger supporter than me. I couldn’t be more pleased with this news.”
“It is an honor and a joy to be part of the team responsible for bringing Philip Pullman’s trilogy of novels His Dark Materials to the BBC,” adds Jane Tranter of Bad Wolf. “Ever since they were first published these books have been a huge influence on so much of my thinking and imagination, and it is enormously inspiring to be now working on them for television adaptation. The broad horizons of television suggests itself as the best of vehicles to capture the expansiveness of the story and worlds of Lyra and Will, and I am looking forward to seeing how Northern Lights, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass will occupy their place in an audience’s imagination across many episodes and seasons.”
Kicking off in 1995 with the publication of Northern Lights, the His Dark Materials series has sold almost 17.5 million copies, and been published in over 40 languages. In 2007, New Line released the movie adaptation The Golden Compass, although the film didn’t perform as well as expected at the box office, with the studio then pulling the plug on two proposed sequels.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PL18yMRIfoszEaHYNDTy5C-cH9Oa2gN5ng&v=W04aXcyQ0NQ
Originally published November 3, 2015. Updated April 14, 2018.
