One of the minds behind Syfy’s brain-bending comics adaptation Happy! is bringing another weird tale to television: Kurt Vonnegut’s iconic, time-twisting satire Slaughterhouse-Five.
Image: Dial Press
Patrick Macmanus will write and executive produce Universal Cable’s adaptation of Vonnegut’s mishmash of sci-fi, dark comedy and war stories. The book follows the non-linear life of Billy Pilgrim, a young soldier haunted by surviving the bombing of Dresden in World War II, who finds himself unstuck from time and experiencing his life out of order (and, on top of all that, an alien abduction).
But in press releases announcing the series, Macmanus said the Slaughterhouse-Five show will not just follow Billy’s jumbled-up life but expand upon and explore the world of Vonnegut’s novel, padding out the relatively brisk story into the scope of a TV series:
There are no lines that Vonnegut ever throws away. But there are certain lines within the book that allude to a much larger world. I’m not just talking about going off into outer space. He alludes to the Balkanization of the United States and to the hydrogen bombing of the United States. I feel like today’s TV is the only way to tell this story. Even though it’s only approximately 275 pages, I think that it’s ripe to be expanded upon exponentially.
So if anything, it seems like Billy’s journey could be more like a framing device, or a window into the worlds the TV series will explore, rather than necessarily the sole driving force of the story. Slaughterhouse-Five has yet to find a home at either a network or a streaming service, but we’ll keep you updated on it as and when we learn more.
[Variety]