John Grisham’s “The Rainmaker” has landed a series order at USA Network, the network announced Wednesday.
Based on Grisham’s best-selling novel and the hit 1997 film, “The Rainmaker” will be written and executive produced by “Code Black” creator Michael Seitzman, who was set to helm the series adaptation when it was in the works at CBS in 2016 and at Hulu in 2018.
Hailing from Lionsgate Television and Blumhouse Television, “The Rainmaker” will be executive produced by Seitzman, Grisham, Jason Richman (“Stumptown,” “The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon”), David Gernert and Jason Blum. Seitzman and Richman cowrote the pilot episode.
The official logline for the series is as follows: “Fresh out of law school, Rudy Baylor goes head-to-head with courtroom lion Leo Drummond as well as his law school girlfriend. Rudy, along with his boss and her disheveled paralegal, uncover two connected conspiracies surrounding the mysterious death of their client’s son.”
The new series order marks the latest collaboration between Lionsgate and Blumhouse, who recently inked a multi-picture film deal to reimagine horror classics from the Lionsgate library, including “The Blair Witch Project.”
Following the “Suits” boom last summer, the series order for “The Rainmaker” marks a return to scripted television for USA Network, which also saw success when “White Collar” hit Netflix earlier this spring.
Grisham’s “The Rainmaker” was published in 1995, and was subsequently adapted into a 1997 action movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola and starring Matt Damon, Danny DeVito, Danny Glover, Claire Danes and Jon Voight.
In 2018, Hulu began development on a Grisham shared universe that would first tackle “Rogue Lawyer” and “The Rainmaker,” with each series set to stand on their own, as well as intersect and share characters, though the projects were no longer in development by late 2019.
Seitzman is repped by WME and Paul Hastings, and Richman is repped by CAA, Fuel Filmworks and Sloane Offer Weber & Dern.
