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Dick and Felix Francis novels optioned for TV
The backlisted horseracing thriller novels by father and son team Dick and Felix Francis have been optioned by TV production company Kudos.
The sale of rights to Kudos were negotiated by Ed Wilson at Johnson & Alcock and Emily Hayward-Whitlock at The Artists Partnership.
The company, which is part of Banijay UK, will create a returning TV show, which is provisionally entitled "The Turf", and is in development with a major UK broadcaster.
Australian showrunner Kris Mrksa, who worked on "White House Farm", "Requiem", "The Blue" is attached to the project, which will draw characters, plotlines and inspiration from over 60 years of novels.
Felix Francis will be an executive producer and series consultant, with Merrick Francis (Dick’s other son) also providing a consultancy role. Dick Francis was a champion jockey, flew planes in the Second World War and became a bestselling crime novelist. He was a three-time Edgar Award winner, multiple CWA Dagger winner, and named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America.
In the final years of his writing, he passed the reins to his son Felix Francis, who now writes the Dick Francis novels published by Simon & Schuster in the UK and Crooked Lane Books in the US.
The backlist of Dick and Felix Francis’ horse-racing crime novels has been optioned by production company Kudos as the basis for an ongoing series—already in development with “a major UK broadcaster”—provisionally titled “The Turf”. The sale to Kudos was negotiated by Ed Wilson at Johnson & Alcock and Emily Hayward-Whitlock at The Artists Partnership.
Australian showrunner Kris Mrksa, whose recent credits include ITV’s “White House Farm” and the BBC/Netflix hit “Requiem”, is attached to the project, which draws characters and inspiration from more than 60 years of the Francis’ novels. Felix Francis will be an executive producer and series consultant for the adaptation, with Merrick Francis (Dick’s other son) also providing a consultancy role.
Dick Francis, who died in 2010, was a champion jockey, flew planes in the Second World War and became a bestselling crime novelist starting with 1962’s Dead Cert. He was a multiple Edgar Award and CWA Dagger winner, and named Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America.
In his final years of writing, he passed the reins to Felix Francis, who now writes the Dick Francis novels published by Simon & Schuster UK and Crooked Lane US. Felix has evolved the brand since his father’s death in 2010, and uses his knowledge of the horse-racing world to create the settings of the novels. His most recent book, Iced, was published in September 2021. Together, they have sold 573,649 books for £4.3m, with their bestseller, Even Money, on 111,567 units sold.
“It has been a long-held ambition of mine to produce real quality dramas of the Dick Francis and Felix Francis stories, and I am so excited that the prospect is a huge step closer thanks to the involvement of Kudos and Kris Mrksa," Felix Francis said.
Karen Wilson, joint m.d. for Kudos, added: “We’re really excited to be working with Felix and Kris and look forward to bringing some of the incredible stories and characters to life for TV audiences.”
