The CW Developing ‘Nancy Drew’ Series From ‘Gossip Girl’ Creators
The CW are hoping third times a charm as a ‘Nancy Drew’ series is, once again, in development at a US network, this time from ‘Gossip Girl’ creators Josh Schwartz & Stephanie Savage.
For those that don’t know the ‘Nancy Drew’ books, they centred on the teenage amateur detective Nancy and her two best friends, the delicate Bess & tomboy George, as they solved various mysteries around their local area. The books were conceived by ‘Hardy Boys’ creator Edward Stratemeyer, but were written mainly by ghostwriters and put out under the pen name Carolyn Keene.
According to Deadline, who broke the news, the show is being written by Noga Landau (‘The Magicians’) and will centre on an 18-year-old Nancy Drew in the summer after her high school graduation. Nancy thought she’d be leaving her hometown for college, but when a family tragedy holds her back another year, she finds herself embroiled in a ghostly murder investigation – and along the way, she uncovers secrets that run deeper than she ever imagined.
Landau will executive produce along with Schwartz & Savage, and Lis Rowinski, from the duo’s production company Fake Empire, will co-executive produce. The series comes from CBS TV Studios in association with Fake Empire.
This marks the third recent attempt to bring the teen detective to screen in one form or another. The 2017 version was set at NBC and came from ‘Doubt’ creators Tony Phelan and Joan Rater. That actually had the lead as the successful adult author of the famous teen detective books who was drawn into a real-life murder mystery. Phelan & Rater previously had a version in development at CBS in 2016 which had Nancy as a grow NYPD detective, which rather removed anything unique about the idea of a teen detective in the first place. The new CW version sticks much closer to the original source material.
Along with creating ‘Gossip Girl’, Schwartz & Savage were also behind CW’s ‘Dynasty’ reboot and ‘Marvel’s Runaways’. Schwartz also co-created ‘Chuck’ and created ‘The O.C.’, whilst Savage created ‘The Astronaut Wives Club’ and was writer/exec producer on ‘The O.C.’ where she first teamed up with Schwartz.
The ‘Nancy Drew’ series is currently only “in development” at The CW, but let’s hope this one fairs better than the last couple of attempts. We’ll let you know if we hear more.
