Jessica Knoll’s recently released thriller Bright Young Women is headed to a TV set near you, Deadline reports.
The TV development rights to the book, described by Kirkus as a “stunning, engaging subversion of the Bundy myth—and the true-crime genre,” have been acquired by Bruna Papandrea‘s Made Up Stories, Erik Feig’s Picturestart, and Fifth Season, with Knoll herself adapting the story and serving as executive producer.
Knoll’s latest, a work of fiction based on the crimes of American serial killer Ted Bundy, quickly shot onto best-seller lists following its publication last month by Simon & Schuster’s Marysue Rucci Books.
Knoll, Made Up Stories, and Picturestart also collaborated on the feature film adaptation of the author’s 2015 debut, Luckiest Girl Alive, which premiered on Netflix in October and became a No. 1 hit.
“We are thrilled to re-team with Jessica Knoll on her brilliantly subversive new novel Bright Young Women after the career highlight that was producing Luckiest Girl Alive together,” Papandrea and Feig told Deadline. “Jessica is the rare writer with the boldness and the skill to take on a true crime story that has been so mythologized in American culture that we’ve all accepted it as fact—until now. Bright Young Women is…the kind of novel that unleashes a cathartic rage at how society gets the story wrong too often, and usually at the expense of women.”
Knoll also offered words of celebration. “Eight years ago, I was a first-time novelist with ambitions of becoming a first-time screenwriter,” she told Deadline. “Bruna and Erik believed in my voice and gave me that shot….I can’t imagine adapting my new novel with anyone else.”
Amy Reiter is a freelance writer.
