Ryan Murphy is heading back to FX! The prolific creator behind American Horror Story, Feud, Doctor Odyssey, 9-1-1 — you know, it might just be easier to list the shows he isn’t involved in — is developing a new series based on The Shards, the 2023 novel from American Psycho author Bret Easton Ellis — and yes, things are about to get unsettling. The project is in early development at FX, with Kaia Gerber attached to star, which marks Gerber’s most significant leading role to date after previous appearances in Murphy’s American Horror Stories and Apple TV+’s Palm Royale.
The Shards adaptation looks set to be a return to familiar territory for Murphy — a glossy, twisted Los Angeles tale laced with paranoia, obsession, and murder. Sounds like a normal weekday in Hollywood, really. The novel, published by Knopf, is a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age thriller that pulls directly from Ellis’ teenage years in 1980s LA.
What Is ‘The Shards’ About?
Described as both a psychological thriller and an unreliable memoir, The Shards bends time and perception to blur the line between teen angst and true horror. Seems like a pretty good fit for the way Murphy likes to do things, doesn’t it? Here’s how the publisher describes the book:
“17-year-old Bret is a senior at the exclusive Buckley prep school when a new student arrives with a mysterious past. Robert Mallory is bright, handsome, charismatic, and shielding a secret from Bret and his friends even as he becomes a part of their tightly knit circle. Bret’s obsession with Mallory is equaled only by his increasingly unsettling preoccupation with the Trawler, a serial killer on the loose who seems to be drawing ever closer to Bret and his friends, taunting them — and Bret in particular — with grotesque threats and horrific, sharply local acts of violence.”
Gerber’s role hasn’t been confirmed, though she is expected to play a major figure within Bret’s circle — perhaps even a gender-flipped version of Mallory or one of his dangerously enraptured classmates. No additional casting or release date has been announced yet, but with FX and Murphy reuniting, it’s undoubtedly going to end up as one of the buzziest new shows on the block, assuming Murphy can find the time alongside his 93 other shows
via Collider