ABC Wants 'Romeo & Juliet' Series And Maybe 'Twilight' Helmer Catherine Hardwicke

EXCLUSIVE: After ordering contemporary versions of Romeo & Juliet set in New York and Chicago the last two pilot seasons, ABC is going for the real thing this year, picking up for development a retelling of William Shakespeare's classic tale set in Renaissance Verona. Catherine Hardwicke, who directed the feature adaptation of another story about star-crossed lovers belonging to clans that are at odds with each other, Twilight, is in talks to direct the potential Romeo & Juliet pilot in what would mark her TV directorial debut. Feature producers Todd Garner (Paul Blart: Mall Cop, the upcoming The Zookeeper) and Wyck Godfrey  & Marty Bowen (the Twilight franchise, Dear John) are behind the series adaptation, which is being written by World Trade Center scribe Andrea Berloff. Romeo & Juliet, which is produced by ABC Studios, follows the famous love story while also pealing away the curtain on the impetuous, incestuous, bloody and violent relationships during the Renaissance in Verona. In addition to Garner, Godfrey and Bowen, Sean Robin will also executive produce the project.
While period dramas are in fashion with AMC's Mad Men, HBO's Boardwalk Empire; AMC's pilot Hell on Wheels, TNT's Hollywood & Vine as well as ABC's own 1960s Pan Am drama in development, costume dramas have been harder for the networks to pull off. Coincidentally, Showtime, which has been successful in the arena with The Tudors, is prepping The Borgias, a drama series which, like Romeo & Juliet, is set in Renaissance Italy. This is not the first Shakespeare work that Hardwicke would be tackling. The director, now in post-production on Red Riding Hood, has also been attached to direct Emile Hirsch in a possible feature adaptation of the Bard's play Hamlet. She has proven she understands teen angst with Twilight as well as her breakthrough directorial debut, Thirteen. Romeo & Juliet would reunite Hardwicke with Godfrey and Bowen who have produced two of her feature directorial efforts, Twilight and The Nativity Story.

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