The Paper's reporter Cheng Xiaojun
As a Hugo Award-winning work, Chinese writer Liu Cixin's novel "The Three-Body Problem" has a large number of fans at home and abroad. Therefore, when the streaming giant Netflix announced that it would shoot an episodic version of "Three-Body Problem" with English dialogue, it immediately attracted the attention of the outside world. Recently, the heavy news about the drama version of "Three-Body Problem" has been broken, and the director and the first batch of actors have been determined, making this highly anticipated work closer and closer to taking shape.
Liu Cixin (left) and Liu Yukun will serve as production consultants.
As early as early September 2020, when the copyright holders of the "Three-Body" trilogy, Three-Body Universe and Youzu Group, announced with Netflix that they would jointly develop the English drama "Three-Body Problem", its strong behind-the-scenes team was exposed. First of all, the original author Liu Cixin and the translator of the English version of "The Three-Body Problem" Liu Yukun, who is also a science fiction novelist, served as production consultants. The screenwriting and production teams include David Benioff and D.B Weiss, who developed Game of Thrones.B. Weiss), and Alexander Woo, who developed True Love Like Blood and Polar Evil. Rian Johnson, director of "The Rings," "Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi," and "Blade Out of the Sheath," and his longtime production partner Ram Bergman will be executive producers.
The three-body version of the film is developed by David Benioff (left) and D.B Weiss.
After nearly a year of brewing, on August 20 this year, the director of the drama version of "Three-Body Problem" was finally determined - Zeng Guoxiang, director of Hong Kong, China. The 42-year-old has directed critically acclaimed films such as "Anti-Corruption Storm", "July and Ansheng", and "Young You". Among them, "Young You" represented Hong Kong, China, was nominated for the Academy Award for Best International Film, and in the last awards season, Zeng Guoxiang was interviewed by many American media, and his popularity abroad increased greatly. This time, he will not only serve as a director, but also as a co-executive producer.
After the dust of the director settles, it is natural that the actor candidates will be revealed. A few days ago, Benioff and Weiss announced the first batch of 12 actors. It was previously rumored that the Latin beauty Eiza González (Eiza González), who was already in the negotiation stage, was indeed on the list, and she had a wonderful performance in film and television works such as "Kill a Dawn", "Extreme Car Thief", "I Care" and so on. Benioff and Weiss' old partner in Game of Thrones, John F. Kennedy, jr. John Bradley and Liam Cunningham also joined the show. Unsurprisingly, there are many oriental faces in the casting, including Benedict Wong, who starred in "Doctor Strange", "Twin Killers", and "Shangqi and the Legend of the Ten Rings"; Zhou Caiqin, a veteran american actor who played Jia Mu in Li Shaohong's version of "Dream of the Red Chamber"; Jess Hong, who starred in "The Mystery of Duan Lin Town", and zeine Tseng, a newcomer actress. In addition, there is Jovan Adepo from the American drama "Watchmen", Marlo Kelly who starred in the thriller "Dare to Challenge Me", Alex Sharp who starred in "The Trial of the Seven Gentlemen of Chicago", Sea Shimooka, who starred in "Trial Expert" and "Green Arrow", and Saamer Usmani, who starred in "Prisoner 760".
The first cast to be announced.
It is not difficult to see that many of the first actors to be announced are young actors who do not have rich acting experience. As for which characters they correspond to in the book, it is difficult to speculate at present. The novel "Three-Body" trilogy consists of "Once Upon a Time on Earth", "Dark Forest", and "Death Immortal". The Netflix series will be filmed from the first one, telling the story of Ye Wenjie, a female scientist born in the 1940s, who was persecuted to death and experienced all kinds of suffering in the human world, and then in interstellar communication, exposed the coordinates of the earth to the trisolarans who are much more civilized than humans, giving them the opportunity to destroy humanity and invade the earth.
It is reported that the drama version of "Three-Body" will start in November, and Netflix has not yet announced when it plans to launch.
Editor-in-charge: Cheng Yu