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A brand new project, which will star Nicolas Cage as Tiger King subject Joe Exotic, has found a home at Amazon.
According to reports from The Hollywood Reporter, the company’s Prime Video streaming platform will develop a scripted series from CBS Television Studios and Imagine Entertainment. Amazon Studios has also come aboard to produce.
The series is going to be based on a 2019 Texas Monthly story about Joe Schreibvogel (aka Joe Exotic) and how he built a private zoo in Oklahoma. The show will also cover his feuds with his rivals in the tiger business, Carole Baskin and Jeff Lowe. All three characters are featured in the smash-hit Netflix docuseries Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness.
This newly announced project starring Nicolas Cage is one of two scripted series based on the story that are currently in the works.
As was announced a few weeks back, Saturday Night Live star Kate McKinnon is set to play the part of Carole Baskin in a drama that‘s been ordered to series as a cross-platform venture on NBC, USA Network and their new streaming platform, Peacock. While that show will surround the same group of characters, the storyline will be based on Wondery’s Joe Exotic podcast.
As for Amazon‘s version of the story, the series will center on Schreibvogel (Cage), an eccentric, exotic zookeeper in Oklahoma who fights tooth and nail to keep his park, even at the risk of losing his sanity. The series will live in the lion’s den with Joe, explore how he became Joe Exotic, and how he lost himself to a character of his own creation.
Behind the scenes, Dan Lagana from American Vandal will serve as showrunner and executive produce with Brian Grazer and Samie Kim Falvey. Meanwhile, Cage is set to executive produce and voice the lead character — a dragon — in another series for Amazon, based on Eoin Colfer‘s novel Hellfire, so it seems like he’s got a good relationship with the company.
The second the Tiger King docuseries hit Netflix, it became an absolute internet sensation. Being release at the beginning of the pandemic, people were stuck inside for months with nothing else to do but watch hours and hours of television--and that’s a big part of why seemingly everyone you know has seen this story.
Now, as we mentioned prior, the docuseries and its characters have inspired two different scripted shows surrounding different aspects of the story. Plus, one of the drama’s most interesting stars, Carole Baskin, landed herself a role on the upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars, which will be an adventure all on its own.
As of now, there’s no word on when Amazon’s Tiger King series is set to start production.