John Buffalo Mailer And Hivemind To Adapt Norman Mailer’s WWII Novel ‘The Naked And The Dead’ Into Limited Series

EXCLUSIVE: John Buffalo Mailer, son of the iconic author Norman Mailer, is partnering with Hivemind, Washington Place Productions and Mailer-Tuchman Media to create a limited series based on his father’s novel The Naked and the Dead. The deal was brokered by UTA. The partnership is packaging the project and seeking a top showrunner.

Hailed as the first novel to come out of World War II, the critically acclaimed epic enjoyed 62 consecutive weeks on the New York Times Best Seller. The Naked and the Dead was based on Norman Mailer’s experiences during WWII. The story follows a platoon of Marines who are stationed on the Japanese-held island of Anopopei. It was adapted into a film in 1958 which was directed by Raoul Walsh, but the TV adaptation will be an opportunity to put the story on a larger canvas.

“Nearly 20 ago my father entrusted the adaptation of ‘he Naked And The Dead to me, but it was too epic a book to fit into a feature-length film, so we held off,” explained John Buffalo Mailer. “Now, the new gilded age of television has enabled a big enough limited series to do it justice. It is an honor to be partnered with this extraordinary group of producers to finally give this iconic book that has dazzled generations the screen adaptation it deserves. It was worth the wait to do it right.”

John Buffalo Mailer will produce with Hivemind’s Sean Daniel and Kathy Lingg, Washington Place Productions’ Miles Mogulescu, and Mailer-Tuchman Media’s Martin Tuchman and Jennifer Gelfer.

Mailer-Tuchman Media is working with Executive Producer Martin Tuchman and Executive Director Jennifer Gelfer on the upcoming features DieRy, Inside Me and The Second Sun. On the TV side, they have the forthcoming series Mailer and Who Wrote the Bible?. John Buffalo Mailer serves as Creative Director of Mailer-Tuchman Media.

Co-founded by Daniel and Lingg in partnership with producers Jason F. Brown and Dinesh Shamdasani, Hivemind works to connect creative talent with globally recognized properties and franchises from the worlds of literary fiction, comic books, video games, and more. They are currently working on Netflix’s The Witcher and Amazon’s The Expanse.

Washington Place Productions’ Miles Mogulescu is an Academy Award nominee and a former Senior VP at MGM. Washington Place Productions is currently producing an English language version of the Cannes award-winning film Moscow Belgium and a docu on the vocal harmony group, The Manhattan Transfer.