Bong Joon-Ho’s acclaimed sci-fi locomotive indictment of capitalism, Snowpiercer, is being, well, capitalized on by TNT, who in Nov. 2016 ordered a pilot of a series based on the film/the French graphic novel on which that itself was based. (That news may have slipped right by you due to some other late capitalist dystopian, erm, events happening in November, 2016.) Now, the potential series’ star has been announced: Tony winning Hamilton breakout/clipping. frontman Daveed Diggs will lead the movement towards the front of the train. (And presumably will take much more time to get there than Chris Evans’ character in the film, given the whole serial drama thing.)
Diggs tweeted relieved confirmation of the news:
According to the Hollywood Reporter, the pilot in question will also be directed by Scott Derrickson, who recently helmed Dr. Strange, and was penned by Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles writer Josh Friedman, who’ll be the showrunner if TNT picks it up beyond a pilot.
The series has the same basic premise as the film and the graphic novel (by Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette), and though Diggs’ character’s name is different from that of Evans’ in the film (Curtis) and that of the lead in the book (Proloff), he seems to fulfill the same role. He’ll play Layton Well, a man who lives in the squalid back of a post apocalyptic, class-divided train that’s perpetually circling a frozen Earth. He’s described in THR as a “quiet thinker who spends his days sniffing the industrial-waste-turned-drug Chronole and tending to his cage full of rats” — and a man who becomes a “reluctant leader” of the resistance central to the series’ plot.
Even on the off chance that TNT decides against a remake of a beloved film (something seemingly no one in Hollywood can decide against), Diggs will still be quite busy with other TV work: The Mayor, the pilot he produced about a rapper who runs for office for publicity but unexpectedly wins, was just ordered to series at ABC.