At the forefront of most biblical retellings are the many patriarchs of the Old Testament or the apostles of the New Testament, with the women who paved the way for Christianity, Judaism and Islamic faith rarely getting their due.
It’s an observation noted by Carol Mendelsohn (“CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”), especially after going back through the Bible and seeing how few women were named — including Hagar, the Egyptian handmaid who gives Sarah and Abraham their first son, whose story is told in the first installment of Fox’s biblical even series, “The Faithful.”
“To frame those stories through the point of view of these women, through their experiences — not diminishing the men in any way — I thought, ‘I would watch that,’” Mendelsohn told TheWrap.
For “The Faithful,” Mendelsohn teamed up with her producing partner Julie Weitz, who oversaw TNT’s biblical series during her time as head of programming, as well as René Echevarria (“Carnival Row,” “The 4400”), who admitted he was initially skeptical of the idea, wondering if the scope of centering the women of the Bible was “too limiting.” “I came to learn … how it just opened up scripture in a way that I never could have imagined,” Echevarria said.
Take God’s call to Abraham to leave his home for the promise of a child, which dramatically alters Sarah’s life as they leave their family to go to the promised land of Canaan. While Echevarria initially included Abraham’s call from God in the script for the first installment centered on Sarah (Minnie Driver) and Hagar (Natacha Karam), he eventually removed it in order to keep focus on Sarah, who wakes up without Abraham by her side and finds him in a daze.
“We didn’t want the audience to have a perspective that Sarah didn’t have,” Echevarria said, noting that the moment helped him unlock the goal of the series. “We [were] … paying attention to the silences in the text — they don’t tell us these things — we really became very attuned through this women’s perspective.”
The first installment sees Sarah take the leap of faith alongside Abraham, and, when God doesn’t deliver on his promise for a child, Sarah steps in and arranges for Abraham to lay with Hagar, giving them Ishmael. It takes another several decades, however, for God to fulfill the promise, with Sarah getting pregnant with Isaac at 90.
“In many ways, Sarah’s [journey of faith] was harder than Abraham, in the sense that … God spoke directly to him — that was a transformative experience,” Echevarria said. “Sarah had to take it all on faith and love for her husband and setting out into the unknown.”
The idea of women of the Bible was quickly embraced by Fox Entertainment president Michael Thorn, who greenlit “The Faithful” as a three-part event series rolling out across Easter and Passover. Then came the task of figuring out which women to highlight, with Echevarria noting how executive producers threw around the idea of starting at the top with Eve or even “Mrs. Noah,” joking, “What would it have been like to be married to the guy who becomes obsessed with building a boat?”
Ultimately, they landed on narrowing their lens on five interconnected women: Sarah and her former slave, Hagar, Sarah’s great-niece Rebekah and Rebekah’s nieces, sisters Leah and Rachel.
“We settled on the matriarchs because I think we all felt that … it’s the place in the Bible where the stories start to feel really historically grounded in real people having these extraordinary encounters,” Echevarria said. “We were very attracted to the idea that it was three generations of a family — the credit sequence that we had designed is a family tree for that very reason.”
As Echevarria set out not to make the characters feel too pious or for the episodes to feel like a Sunday school lesson, he recalls the advice Mendelsohn gave him as he went off to write: “Write them like they don’t know they’re in the Bible.”
“These are flawed people — strong, powerful, bold, brave — but also flawed … figuring life out,” he said.
As Mendelsohn and Echevarria kickstarted the casting process — which led them to find their Sarah in Minnie Driver, their Abraham in Jeffrey Donovan and their Hagar in Natacha Karam — there was a serendipity in the air from the start.
“Every actor that we went out to basically said, ‘Yes,’” Mendelsohn shared. “Everyone was drawn to tell these stories and in such a beautiful way, just as Julie, René and I were drawn to this … everyone that worked on our show felt the same.”
The air of faith extended beyond the words on the page as cast and crew shared their personal journeys with faith during downtime on set. As Echevarria put it, “So many times, people would share … ‘This project came to came at the right time in my life,’ whether it was losing a parent or having trouble with your kid.”
“People are looking to believe in something — faith is so important to get us through every day and it is as true today as it was back then,” Mendelsohn added. “Exploring these characters — these women from the inside out — really makes me wonder, how much have we changed? It makes you feel part of what came before.”
While the first set of the event series will have two additional installments rolling out through Easter, Mendelsohn and Echevarria revealed they have been kicking around ideas for more stories, should the series find an audience. “We talked early on … do we just hop scotch around the Bible? There’s so many great stories and our fondest hope would be able to get to tell them someday,” Echevarria said.
“The Faithful: Women of the Bible” airs Sundays at 8 p.m. PT on Fox, with its finale on Easter Sunday, April 5.
