Making A Murderer - On Set With The Alienist
Entertainment Weekly|January 19, 2018

EW goes behind the scenes of TNT's Sumptuous, star-laden adaptation of caleb carr's blockbuster 1994 novel. 

Leah Greenblatt
Making A Murderer - On Set With The Alienist

SNOW IS FALLING SOFTLY ON NEW YORK’S Williamsburg Bridge, wafting to the ground in a swirl of winter white. Inconveniently, it’s also starting to drizzle, because this is actually Budapest in April, and the paper-chemical compound the “flakes” are made of really isn’t designed to get wet. That means a pivotal scene in TNT’s lushly ambitious new period drama The Alienist will probably have to take a literal rain check. But the far-flung location and swank production values are also a sign of how committed the basic-cable network is to making its mark in the prestige-programming arena: Almost no expense has been spared to bring Caleb Carr’s bestselling 1994 novel—set in turn-of-the-20th-century New York and centered on a series of gruesome child murders—to the screen.

Which screen is one of the reasons it’s taken more than two decades to get here; for years after producer Scott Rudin purchased the rights with Paramount, a team of writers worked mightily to wrestle its sprawling narrative down to acceptable film length. Eventually the studio pivoted to a 10-episode TV arc (debuting Jan. 22 at 9 p.m.) but kept the cinematic feel, and booked the movie stars to match: Daniel Brühl, Dakota Fanning, and Luke Evans, all of whom have rarely, if ever, appeared in TV roles. Their characters, and several supporting players (see sidebar), join forces to form a sort of extrajudicial Justice League, racing the clock to find a ritualistic killer the local authorities seem in no rush to track down on their own time.

This story is from the January 19, 2018 edition of Entertainment Weekly.

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This story is from the January 19, 2018 edition of Entertainment Weekly.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.