13 Reasons Why creator, Brian Yorkey, has signed onto a multiple year contract with Netflix, including a limited series thriller called Echoes. Yorkey has a background in Broadway with a rock musical titled Next to Normal that was released in 2008. It is about a mother with bipolar disorder and the impacts it has on her family. It went on to win 3 of its eleven Tony award nominations and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. However, he would eventually make the move from the stage onto the screen.
Yorkey went on to adapt Jay Asher's 2007 novel, 13 Reasons Why, into a series for Netflix. The drama ran from 2017-2020 over the course of four seasons. The show follows teenager Clay Jensen (Dylan Minnette) after his classmate, Hannah (Katherine Langford), dies by suicide and leaves behind a collection of tapes detailing why she did it. Even though the show received some backlash on whether or not it was glorifying suicide, it remains to be a popular series.
THR reported that Yorkey signed a multiple-year deal with Netflix, which includes his new series Echoes. For this project, he will be teaming up with Vanessa Gazy (Eden) and Quinton Peeples (Runaways). Echoes follows identical twins, named Leni and Gina. Unknown to others, they have swapped lives. This results in them living a double life as they have reached adulthood. They have two of everything, including houses, husbands, as well as a kid. When one of the sisters disappears, the world they built begins to fall apart. The thriller series will be seven episodes long. See below for Yorkey and Gazy's statements:
Yorkey: “’m so excited to be embarking on Echoes with Quinton, Vanessa, Imogen, and the Netflix team—and I’m eagerly looking forward to what I hope will be many more years of making cool stuff with Netflix. It’s a privilege and an unmatched thrill to make a television show that reaches around the world on the instant it launches — and an incredible opportunity not only to entertain and surprise, but maybe even say something that matters about the way we live now.”
Gazy: “My journey with Echoes started with an Australian initiative led by executive producer Imogen Banks to nurture new female voices in television — and now here we are at Netflix! I’m so excited to be bringing the show to a wide and international audience alongside the formidable showrunning duo that is Brian Yorkey and Quinton Peeples.
The limited series has reportedly been in development for at least a year before it was officially given the go-ahead. Given that Yorkey has created material for the stage and for Netflix, it is exciting to see what he has coming next. While Broadway and Hollywood operate in different mediums, they oftentimes share talent as well as the stories themselves. Echoes is only the first project within this Netflix deal, so it is only a matter of time before more titles are announced.
Netflix has been scoring deals with numerous filmmakers, including the likes of Steven Spielberg's Amblin Partners. Despite the fact that several filmmakers retaliated against the streaming giant in the beginning, many of them have started to change their tune. Netflix has always been known for having a "let us see what sticks" strategy, acquiring everything they can. However, it has managed to give audiences a lot of good content that might not have found a home otherwise. Stay tuned for more details on Echoes as it develops.
Source: THR