'True Detective' director Cary Fukunaga to helm 'The Alienist' TV series

Director Cary Fukunaga returns to the world of television. The filmmaker behind every episode of HBO's first season of True Detective joins the director's chair for the upcoming The Alienist TV series.

The Wrap has the exclusive. Based on the Caleb Carr novel, this new drama centers on Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, a Gilded Age New York City citizen who, with the help of John Moore, a newspaper reporter, and Theodore Roosevelt, here a police commissioner, use developing psychology disciplines to track one of New York City's first serial killers.

This plot description does seem like a fun mix of True Detective and Cinemax's The Knick, which I'm sure a Parmount Television head, whose banner hosts this upcoming program, had in mind. In addition to Paramount, Anonymous Content hosts The Alienist under their name, and that company also worked on True Detective. Meanwhile, Hossein Amini (Drive) wrote the pilot and serves as an executive producer, a position he shares alongside Eric Roth (Forrest Gump).

The Alienist is a fascinating and distinctive, fast-paced psychological thriller that is wonderfully evocative of the unrivaled Gilded Age of New York City,” Amy Powell, president of Paramount Television, said in a statement. “Cary Fukunaga’s unique vision and ability to render compelling, distinctive and superbly atmospheric direction is the perfect voice for this television series. We are thrilled to have not only Cary’s expert direction, but also the creativity, imagination and storytelling abilities of the supremely talented Eric Roth and Hossein Amini.”

It's unclear just how involved Fukunaga is for this show. It's likely he's not at the helm of every episode again, but it's also not unclear if he's directing the pilot, or more episodes or even that first installment.

It is known, however, this is not Fukunaga's first priority. He recently finished up his newest movie Beasts of No Nation, which Netflix acquired and releases later this year. He currently is working on a film adaptation of Stephen King's It.

Image courtesy of INFevents.com

{"code":"internal_server_error","message":"

There has been a critical error on your website.<\/p>

Learn more about debugging in WordPress.<\/a><\/p>","data":{"status":500},"additional_errors":[]}