WGN America Developing a Series Based on Russian Novel Roadside Picnic
Debi Moore
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The folks at WGN America are hitting it out of the park with “Salem,” and now they’re about to dip their toes into the more sci-fi side of things with an adaptation in the works of Roadside Picnic, the 1972 novel written by Russian brothers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky.
Per Deadline, the potential series is being written by Jack Paglen (Transcendence), directed by Alan Taylor (Terminator Genisys, “Game of Thrones”), and produced by Neal Moritz (Goosebumps, the Fast & Furious franchise). Sony Pictures TV, where the project was developed as a spec, is the studio, partnering with Tribune Studios. Paglen and Taylor executive produce with Original Film’s Moritz and Vivian Cannon.
Roadside Picnic is about an alien visitation to planet Earth, whose aftermath has led to the creation of “Zones” in the areas where the aliens had possibly landed. The Zones exhibit strange and dangerous phenomena not understood by humans and contain artifacts with inexplicable, seemingly supernatural properties. It was the basis for Andrei Tarkovsky’s filmic masterpiece Stalker and the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. video games that have proven immensely popular.
Book Synopsis:
Red Schuhart is a stalker, one of those young rebels who are compelled, in spite of the extreme danger, to venture illegally into the Zone to collect the mysterious artifacts that the alien visitors left scattered around. But when he and his friend Kirill go into the Zone together to pick up a “full empty,” something goes terribly wrong.
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