The iconic 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest may become a television series, according to producer Saul Zaentz’ nephew Paul Zaentz, who helped bring the original adaptation of Ken Kesey’s 1962 novel to Hollywood.
“I just signed an agreement with Ken Kesey’s widow and family to develop a television series, where we will do it through the point of view of Chief for the first season,” Zaentz recently revealed on the CK Cafe podcast. “After the first season will be what happens to Chief after he escapes [from the hospital].”
He also noted that the TV show version of the story would come at the project “from a totally different point of view” than the film. The producer also revealed on the podcast that the show would allow for “more character development, introducing more characters, and more subplots.”
He also confirmed the show’s development to Entertainment Weekly, however no showrunners or writers are attached to the show as of yet.
The original film starred Jack Nicholson as a convict sent to a psychiatric facility for tests and observation who encourages his peers to stand up to the ward’s terrifying head nurse, Louise Fletcher’s Nurse Ratched.
Though the movie won a whopping five Oscars — Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay, as well as Best Actor and Best Actress for Nicholson and Fletcher, respectively — Kesey was unhappy with the film because it tweaked his original work and made Nicholson’s R.P. McMurphy the central character rather than being told from the perspective of Chief Bromden, played by Will Sampson.
“Ken Kesey was not happy,” Zaentz said of the author’s feelings on the movie. “He claims he hated the film, but he also says he never saw the film.”
During a recent press conference at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in the Czech Republic, he revealed how he sees the show’s arc as of the early development stages. “At the end of the first [season], the R.P. McMurphy, the Jack Nicholson character, would die,” Zaentz said, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “And then the second year would be what happens to the Chief after he escapes.”
Lex Briscuso is a film and television critic and a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. You can follow her on Twitter at @nikonamerica.
