Kidman to adapt Ahern's feminist short stories for TV

Nicole Kidman and the team behind “Big Little Lies” are helping to adapt Cecelia Ahern’s upcoming short story collection into a TV show.

Kidman and producer Per Saari’s Blossom Films will collaborate with Australian producer Bruna Papandrea’s company Made Up Stories, US literary agent Theresa Park and Ahern and her Greenlight Go Productions label to produce a series based on Roar, a collection of 30 stories about the modern woman’s experience. The book will be published by HarperCollins in November with publication in the US slated for April 2019, from Grand Central Publishing.

Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch are attached as executive producers and showrunners for the series, which is being developed in partnership with Endeavor Content. Flahive and Mensch are the co-creators and showrunners of Netflix’s Emmy and Golden Globe-nominated series “Glow”, having previously written for shows such as “Orange is the New Black” and “Nurse Jackie”.

Ahern will serve as an executive producer on “Roar” alongside Flahive, Mensch, Kidman, Saari, Papandrea, Made Up Stories’ Steve Hutensky, and Park. Papandrea, Kidman and Saari previously teamed to produce last year’s Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning HBO series “Big Little Lies”. Kidman and Saari are also actively developing and executive producing “The Expatriates”, based on Janice Y K Lee’s bestselling novel, alongside Theresa Park.

Ahern is represented for TV and film by Anonymous Content and for publishing by Park Literary & Media. Blossom Films is represented by CAA and Alan Wertheimer at Jackoway Tyerman Wertheimer Austen Mandelbaum Morris & Klein, Made Up Stories is represented by WME while Park is represented by Scott Schwimer, Esq.

A spokesperson for Ahern described Roar as “insightful, moving and humorous”, with each story features a woman exploring a different absurd contradiction or issue in her life – a sometimes comic, always moving look at the guilt, joys, humiliation and triumphs that define the modern woman’s experience.

Ahern said: “I’m incredibly honoured to be working with this phenomenal team in bringing Roar from the page to the screen. The women in this collection have lived and breathed with me for so very long, I’m excited to begin the next journey of amplifying their voices.”

The author is published around the world in nearly 50 countries, selling 5.4 million books for £30.4m, with her bestseller P.S I Love You at 548,438 copies sold in paperback, according to Nielsen BookScan.

Two of her books have been adapted as films, P.S I Love You and Love, Rosie. Ahern also co-created and produced the TV series "Samantha Who?"

It is not yet known if a broadcaster is attached to the project.