Julian Fellowes To Adapt Detective Brunetti Books As TV Series In Works At 20th Television From Late Producer Ileen Maisel
EXCLUSIVE: Julian Fellowes is going from crimes of high society to real crimes. The Downton Abbey and The Gilded Age creator is set to write and executive produce a TV adaptation of Swiss-American author Donna Leon’s contemporary Detective Brunetti book series, which is in development at 20th Television.
The project was originated and set up at the studio by Fellowes’ longtime friend and mentor, producer Ileen Maisel who died in February at the age of 68. She had been in the 20th Television fold since 2018 when she signed a first-look deal with its former division Fox21.
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Maisel will be credited as an executive producer on the Brunetti series alongside writer Fellowes, Gesine Lubben, PK Fellowes and Lawrence Elman. Author Leon will co-executive produce. Playwright Felix Legge will serve as co-writer and producer.
While the setting is contemporary, the Brunetti series adaptation’s official description pays homage to a literary classic with its first line echoing the opening line of Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina:
“Unhappy detectives are all alike; a happy detective struggles to stay happy in their own way. In fading Venice, far from the tourist crowds, detective Commissario Brunetti faces a daily battle to protect his city, and his family, from the harsh realities of murder, corruption, and of course the interference of his aristocratic in-laws.”
This is a rare venture into contemporary material for Fellowes whose career as a writer has been devoted to period movies and TV series, including his Oscar-winning feature writing debut, Gosford Park, his Emmy-winning Downton Abbey series, which spawned a successful movie franchise, his current hit, HBO’s The Gilded Age, which has been nominated for an Outstanding Drama Series, and Epix+’s Belgravia.
Fellowes’ very first “story by” writing credit, was on a detective series, a 1980 Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson British co-production series. Arguably his most notable contemporary work was serving as co-writer on the 2010 feature The Tourist, starring Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp, which also was set in Venice.
But it was likely Fellowes close relationship with Maisel, whom he honored with a loving tribute following her death, that led him to the Brunetti TV series.
Leon’s Brunetti franchise, about fictional detective Guido Brunetti, launched with the 1992 novel Death at La Fenice. The book series, noted for its characters and mysteries as well as its authentic portrayal of ordinary Venetian life, has grown to 33 tomes (and counting) over the past 32 years, most recently A Refiner’s Fire, released earlier this year. It was named as one of the Best Mystery Books of 2024 by The Washington Post. The Brunetti novels have sold millions of copies and have been translated into 35 languages, though not into Italian. The first 26 of them were adapted into a German TV series.
Fellowes is currently filming Season 3 of The Gilded Age and is in post-production on the Downton Abbey 3 movie which is set for a September 2025 release. He is repped by UTA and 42. Legge is repped by 42.
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