Fox 21 Television Studios won the option to bestseller “The Residence” by Kate Andersen Brower following a highly competitive bidding process, with Kevin Spacey and Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly attached to produce.
The book follows the upstairs/downstairs relationships between White House staff and various presidential families throughout the years, an all-American “Downton Abbey.”
Spacey and “House of Cards” producing partner Dana Brunetti are attached to executive produce through Trigger Street. Kelly makes her first foray into scripted television as co-EP, and Anderson Brower serves as technical consultant.
“The book is so well-written, and the perfect source material for the kind of show we like to make,” Fox 21 TV Studios President Bert Salke said in a statement. “We’re interested in things that are both challenging and insightful but also multigenerational and multicultural.”
“The White House is our royalty,” Salke added. “This is stuff you haven’t seen before — and it’s real.”
A search for a writer for the project is underway, and it is expected to be shopped to cable networks soon.