Fox is going into the Alan Moore business.
The network and its studio counterpart has given a put pilot commitment to an adaptation of Moore and Kevin O'Neill's widely popular graphic novels League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
PHOTOS: Broadcast TV's Returning Shows 2013-14
Michael Green (Green Lantern, Kings, The River, Heroes, Smallville) will serve as writer and executive producer and, should the project go to series, showrunner. 3 Arts' Erwin Stoff (The Matrix, Kings) will also executive produce. Neither Moore nor O'Neill will be producers on the series.
League is described as a drama based on Moore's graphic novels about a group of Victorian age literary characters, including Captain Nemo, the Invisible Man, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde who team up to fight a common enemy.
League marks 20th TV's first big drama sale at Fox for the new development season.
For Moore, League marks his latest graphic novel to get the Hollywood treatment. Watchmen, V for Vendetta and League have all been adapted for the big screen. Warner Home Video also adapted Watchmen as a motion comic for a straight to home video release.
STORY: Upfronts 2013: Complete Network Scorecard
Moore has won numerous Jack Kirby Awards -- among the pinnacle of comic book prizes -- during his storied career for work including Swamp Thing and Watchmen. He earned the Eisner Award for best comic writer nine times since 1988. League started as a comic series in 1999. Elements from the first volume of the series were used to for a loose feature film adaptation in 2003 starring Sean Connery. The film, which came with an estimated production budget of $78 million, grossed $179 million worldwide.
The project comes as classic literary characters including Jekyll and Hyde and others continues to be popular on the small screen. NBC for its part attempted a Jekyll and Hyde drama (Do No Harm) last year, which was canceled after two episodes. Showtime, meanwhile, is prepping Penny Dreadful, a monster origin story drama series featuring classic monsters from Dracula like Dr. Frankenstein and more. NBC will also launch its own Dracula series in the fall with Jonathan Rhys Meyers.
Green is repped by WME, 3 Arts and Felker Toczek.
E-mail: Lesley.Goldberg@THR.com
Twitter: @Snoodit
