Media Murder for Monday

It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

TomKat MeDiA has secured rights to Duff Wilson’s eco-thriller, Fateful Harvest, and Aaron Bobrow-Strain’s award-winning work of narrative nonfiction, The Death and Life of Aida Hernandez, with plans to develop both as feature films. Based on a Seattle Times investigative series reported by Wilson that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, Fateful Harvest tells the story of Patty Martin, the mayor of a small town in Washington who blows the whistle on industrial toxic waste dumping and is nearly run out of town. The Death and Life of Aida Hernandez is the story of a young woman whose life spans both sides of the U.S.-Mexican border and whose resilience pushes her to survive her own attempted murder, family abuse, incarceration, deportation, separation from her son, and the U.S. immigration system.

Netflix and Dark Horse Entertainment have inked a multi-year, first-look film and TV partnership and announced they are developing two new projects including a film titled Bang! The spy thriller is based on the comic series by Matt Kindt and Wilfredo Torres, and follows a terrorist cult that sets out to start the apocalypse with a series of novels meant to brainwash their readers. The world’s most celebrated spy is then sent to track down and kill the author responsible. Idris Elba (Luther) will star in the film, adapted by Kindt who penned the screenplay along with Zak Olkewicz.

Director Jeff Nichols’s film, The Bikers, which is inspired by the photography of Danny Lyon and his 1967 book, The Bikeriders, is rounding up an all-star cast that includes Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, and Tom Hardy in leading roles. The film is an original story set in the 1960s following the rise of a fictional Midwestern motorcycle club. Seen through the lives of its members, the club evolves over the course of a decade from a gathering place for local outsiders into a more sinister gang, threatening the original group’s unique way of life.

TELEVISION/STREAMING SERVICES

Hulu has given a series order to the thriller The Other Black Girl, an adaptation of Zakiya Dalila Harris’s novel of the same name, which is described as "a whip-smart and dynamic thriller and sly social commentary." The series follows Nella, an editorial assistant, who is tired of being the only black woman at her company, so she’s excited when Hazel is hired. But as Hazel’s star begins to rise, Nella's fortunes spiral downward, and she discovers something sinister is going on at the company. The book is based on Harris’s time working at the Penguin Random House-owned publisher, Atria/Simon & Schuster.

Keanu Reeves will star in the "long-gestating adaptation" of Erik Larson's 2003 bestselling book, The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America. It tells the story of Daniel H. Burnham (Reeves), a demanding but visionary architect who races to make his mark on history with the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, and Dr. H. H. Holmes, America’s first modern serial killer and the man behind the notorious "Murder Castle" built in the Fair’s shadow. The project will mark Reeves’s first major U.S. TV role. The eight-episode series is currently targeted for a 2024 launch on Hulu.

Additional cast members have been named for A Man in Full, Netflix's six-episode limited series from David E. Kelley and Regina King based on Tom Wolfe's 1998 novel. Joining previously announced stars Jeff Daniels and Diane Lane are William Jackson Harper (Love Life), Tom Pelphrey (Ozark), Aml Ameen (Boxing Day), Sarah Jones (For All Mankind), Jon Michael Hill (Widows) and Chanté Adams (A League of Their Own). Kelley serves as writer, executive producer, and showrunner, with King directing three episodes. The story centers on Atlanta real estate mogul Charlie Croker (Daniels), who faces sudden bankruptcy when political and business interests collide as he defends his empire from those attempting to capitalize on his fall from grace. But the story also displays Wolfe's usual social commentary as it tackles racial tensions via a star Georgia Tech running back who is accused of date-raping the daughter of a pillar of the white establishment; networks of illegal Asian immigrants crisscrossing the continent; daily life behind bars; and a shady real estate syndicate.

Rosanna Arquette has joined the third season of Big Sky, the series based on the novels of crime author C.J. Box, in a key recurring role. Arquette will play Virginia "Gigi" Cessna, the charismatic, fast-talking mother of undersheriff Jenny Hoyt (Katheryn Winnick). She’s a world-class scam artist who used a young Jenny in her grifts years ago and has an uncanny ability to charm her way into people’s lives and then disappear without a trace. When she returns to Montana to pull her latest con, Jenny catches onto her and mother-daughter must work through their difficult relationship. In Season 3, titled "Deadly Trails," Hoyt, private detective Cassie Dewell (Kylie Bunbury), and newly appointed sheriff Beau Arlen (Jensen Ackles) maintain order in Helena, Montana with their unparalleled investigative skills. But when a local backcountry trip led by charismatic outfitter, Sunny Barnes (Reba McEntire), goes awry, the trio faces their most formidable mystery yet – in which no camper can be trusted and where danger lurks around every jagged rock and gnarled tree. Season 3 premieres September 21 on ABC.

PODCASTS/VIDEO/RADIO/AUDIO

It Was a Dark and Stormy Book Club featured Molly MacRae and her novel Argyles and Arsenic, the fifth book in the Highland Bookshop Mystery Series.

The latest episode of the Crime Cafe podcast featured Debbi Mack's interview with crime writer David Rohlfing chatting about his Detective Sasha Frank mysteries.

On Queer Writers of Crime, Philip switched from reviewing his usual mysteries to tackle a suspense and thriller novel that involves spies, Nazis, a male brothel, and southern prejudice.

The Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine podcast featured a classic story by author William Brittain, who wrote for EQMM from 1964 to 1983. It’s read by EQMM author and translator, Josh Pachter, who has edited three collections of William Brittain’s stories. The short is titled "The Man Who Read John Dickson Carr," from the December 1965 issue of EQMM and was the first in a series of stories whose titles begin "The Man Who."

On Crime Time FM, Beverley Jones, aka B.E. Jones, spoke with host Paul Burke about Jones's novels, The Beach House and The Wilderness (the latter of which is being adapted by Firebird Pictures/Amazon Prime and stars Jenna Coleman and Oliver Jackson Cohen).

Red Hot Chili Writers welcomed historical crime writer Mark Wightman, who offered up a brief history of Singapore and revealed the origins of the Singapore Sling. Also discussed was Agatha Christie's vanishing act in 1926, which inspired the world's largest crime fiction festival.

THEATRE

A new version of the celebrated murder mystery, Dial M for Murder is being staged this month at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, CA. The original stage play was written by English playwright, Frederick Knott, and has been newly adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher in a world-premiere version for the Old Globe. The plot centers around Tony, who is convinced his wife Margot has been cheating on him. Now it seems the affair is over, but in his jealousy, Tony spins a web of suspicion and deception that will tighten around them and ensnare them both in danger, recrimination, and murder.