Neil Gaiman has a number of projects going on these days with TV/streaming adaptations with Good Omens getting a second season and The Sandman being worked on. Now, he can add his standalone book Anansi Boys to the mix, though it’s connected to the American Gods property without being a sequel or all that strongly connect. Gaiman will be writing the six-episode limited series with Sir Lenny Henry with plans to begin shooting in Scotland later in 2021.
While Orlando Jones played the character of Anansi in American Gods, it’s not known at this point if he’d reprise the role for this as the character appears in both novels.
“Anansi Boys began around 1996, from a conversation I had with Lenny Henry about writing a story that was diverse and part of the culture that we both loved. I wrote a novel, an (I hope) joyous and funny book about a dead god and his two sons, about birds and ghosts and beasts and cops, based in Caribbean and African tales. It was my first number one NYT Bestseller, and went on to become a beloved and award-winning book,” Gaiman said.
“Anansi Boys as a TV series has been a long time coming — I first started working with Endor and Red on making it over a decade ago. We needed Amazon Prime to come on board and embrace our vision, we needed a lead director with the craft and vision of Hanelle Culpepper, we needed the creative and technical wizardry of Douglas Mackinnon, who worked out how we could push the bounds of the possible to shoot a story set all over the world in a huge studio outside Edinburgh, and we needed the rest of the amazing talents that nobody knows about yet,” he added.
Plot Concept: Fat Charlie Nancy’s normal life ended the moment his father dropped dead on a Florida karaoke stage. Charlie didn’t know his dad was a god. And he never knew he had a brother. Now brother Spider is on his doorstep—about to make Fat Charlie’s life more interesting . . . and a lot more dangerous.
