‘Talented Mr. Ripley’ TV Series In The Works From Steve Zaillian
By Chris Evangelista/March 21, 2019 5:00 pm EST
Deadline reports that a new Tom Ripley TV series from Steve Zaillian is considered a “hot package” right now, so expect some big network to snap it up soon. Zaillian is using Patricia Highsmith’s five Ripley novels – The Talented Mrs. Ripley, Ripley Under Ground, Ripley’s Game, The Boy Who Followed Ripley and Ripley Underwater – as the basis for the show.
Highsmith’s books have already inspired several adaptations. The Talented Mr. Ripley was first adapted as the 1960 French film Purple Noon. Ripley’s Game served as the inspiration for the 1977 movie The American Friend, starring Dennis Hopper. In 1999, The Talented Mr. Ripley got the adaptation treatment again, with Matt Damon in the lead role. Ripley Under Ground was adapted in 2005, starring Barry Pepper. And Ripley’s Game came to the screen yet again in 2002, starring John Malkovich. Here’s the synopsis for the first in the series:
Tom Ripley, a young striver, is newly arrived in the heady world of Manhattan. A product of a broken home, branded a “sissy” by his dismissive Aunt Dottie, Ripley meets a wealthy industrialist who hires him to bring his playboy son, Dickie Greenleaf, back from gallivanting in Italy. Soon Ripley’s fascination with Dickie’s debonair lifestyle turns obsessive as he finds himself enraged by Dickie’s ambivalent affections for Marge, a charming American dilettante.
