EXCLUSIVE: FX is getting back into espionage.
Deadline understands that the network is developing drama series Drug Spies, from Noah Pink, who wrote the screenplay for the upcoming Tetris movie at Apple, author Kirk Wallace Johnson and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier director Kari Skogland.
We hear that the original series, which is inspired by true events, tells the stories of spies who work on behalf of multinational drug companies.
FX is understood to have beaten out a number of rivals to land the project, which is in the early stages of development, in a competitive bidding process.
Sister, the company run by Liz Murdoch, Stacey Snider and Jane Featherstone, which was behind hit HBO series Chernobyl, is producing in association with Oil & Cattle. Sister is also behind Netflix’s upcoming six-parter Eric, starring Benedict Cumberbatch playing a puppeteer whose son goes missing in 1980s Manhattan from Abi Morgan, and Amazon’s forthcoming series The Power from Naomi Alderman.
While some of the plot details are behind kept under wraps, we hear the character driven series tells the story of two former CIA special forces soldiers who are dispatched by Big Pharma to take down the most prominent generic drug producer in the world.
Pink is writing the pilot, based on a story that he and Wallace Johnson came up with, and is set to serve as showrunner. He is the creator of Nat Geo’s Genius and wrote Tetris, which stars Taron Egerton and is set to premiere later this month after premiering at SXSW. He also wrote a script for the upcoming Fred Astaire movie, directed by Paul King, that has Tom Holland attached as the star.
He created Drug Spies with Wallace Johnson, the author behind books including The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession and the Natural History Heist of the Century and The Fisherman and the Dragon: Fear, Greed and a Fight for Justice on the Gulf Coast.
Skogland is attached to director, coming off the back of the hit Marvel series. She has also directed episodes of Showtime’s The Loudest Voice and Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale. Skogland is also directing the Wind River sequel from a screenplay from Patrick Massett and John Zinman and starring Martin Sensmeier.
The trio will exec produce with Sister’s Kate Fenske.
Pink is repped by Gersh and Hansen Jacobson, Skogland is repped by WME and Anonymous Content and Wallace Johnson is repped by CAA.