The BBC plans to adapt Caleb Azumah Nelson's 2021 debut novel Open Water into a TV series. Deadline reported that Banijay-backed Mam Tor is making the series alongside Newen Studios-backed B-Side Productions, with Nelson serving as the project's lead writer, director and executive producer. The author's second novel, Small Worlds, is being adapted by Brock Media.
"I can't wait for viewers not only to meet Marcus and Effie but to step into their world: their private, intimate spaces, their communities, their desires," Nelson said.
BBC drama head Lindsay Salt said that Nelson is "another example of us backing a first time TV writer. He is one of those extraordinary voices and we are going to go on to see a great many things."