TV: Rivers of London

Stolen Picture, the production company set up by Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, will adapt Ben Aaronovitch's epic Rivers of London fantasy book series for television. Deadline reported that the series follows Peter Grant, "an ordinary police constable turned magician's apprentice as he solves crimes across the British capital with a blend of urban fantasy, mystery thriller and fantasy caper. The franchise has sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide."

Frost said he read the first book--titled Midnight Riot in the U.S.--on holiday years ago: "Suddenly we were in a position where I said 'there's this book that I loved' and it became available, more or less. I was chuffed to bits that I could get the rights to make it into a TV show. Everyone wants to potentially find the next Game of Thrones and the chance to turn Rivers of London into an eight-hour movie and hopefully find someone who will financially back that is a real draw."

Pegg observed: "This era we're in now, TV has suddenly evolved into something far more cinematic, where you can tell stories and elaborate. A lot of books that are made into film are criticized for not being as good as the book, because they are contracted into something more simplistic. But what TV offers us now, which is a cinematic playing field, you can tell these stories with scope and get into creative detail."

Aaronovitch, who will serve as an executive producer, added: "I've worked in television before so I was wary of sticking my head back into that lion's den. It was a difficult thing to sell so that it wouldn't get horribly butchered, and television up to now has had a lot of difficulties. [But] how could I say no [to Pegg and Frost]? I feel confident on several levels. I'm working with creators and I know these people don't like bollocks. There will be creative conflicts and where external forces force us to make compromises but I know that the starting point is that we won't make those compromises unless we have to. [Simon and Nick] are tremendous nerds and I don't have to explain things to do them about magic, they just get it. we have a common language, which we don't have in a lot of TV companies."

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