Netflix’s East of Eden miniseries, first announced back in 2022, just got a major update. Poor Things star Christopher Abbott is in talks to play the series’ male lead, opposite the previously-cast Florence Pugh. Deadline reports that Abbott would play Adam Trask, the patriarch of a family in California’s Salinas Valley.
The miniseries is set to be written by Zoe Kazan, who will also executive produce; best known for her acting career, she also wrote the screenplays for the films Ruby Sparks and Wildlife. She has a familial connection to the novel; Kazan’s grandfather, Hollywood legend Elia Kazan, directed East of Eden‘s first film adaptation in 1955. Pugh, who is set to play Trask’s estranged wife-turned-brothel madam Cathy Ames, will also co-produce the miniseries. There is no production start date for the project, which is receiving its first public update in twi years.
What Is ‘East of Eden’ About?
The magnum opus of American author John Steinbeck, East of Eden was released in 1952; it’s a multi-generational saga that follows the Trask family from the American Civil War to the end of World War I, paralleling and subverting the Biblical parable of Cain and Abel. It was previously adapted for the screen in 1955; due to the length and scope of the novel, the film only adapts its final section. Considered one of the greatest films of the 1950s, it is one of only three films to star James Dean, and is the only one of the three to be released before his death in a car crash. It also starred Julie Harris, Richard Davalos, Burl Ives, Jo Van Fleet, and Raymond Massey as an older Adam Trask. It was subsequently adapted as an eight-hour ABC miniseries in 1981; it starred Nancy Allen, Timothy Bottoms, Jane Seymour, and Bruce Boxleitner. There have been numerous subsequent attempts to adapt the novel for the screen. Ron Howard, Tom Hooper, and Gary Ross have been attached to the project at various times; Jennifer Lawrence was announced as the star of an adaptation in 2013 that languished in development hell.
After a showy role in last year’s Poor Things, Abbott is having a busy year. He is next set to star alongside Barry Keoghan and Colm Meaney in the thriller Bring Them Down, and will menace Aaron Taylor-Johnson in the upcoming Sony superhero film Kraven the Hunter; he will also play the titular lycanthrope in Leigh Whannell‘s The Wolf Man next year.
Neflix’s East of Eden miniseries is in development. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.
