One of the darkest dark comedies of the ’80s is headed to television, but is the world really ready for a Heathers TV series?
TV Land has announced plans to develop a series based on the 1988 cult classic about a high school girl whose desire to leave her snobby clique takes a deadly turn when she accidentally kills the group’s leader. The adaptation is expected to take the form of an anthology series set in the modern day, with the show’s protagonist dealing with a new — but similarly vicious — group of popular high school students.
Directed by Michael Lehman (Airheads, 40 Days and 40 Nights) from a script by Daniel Waters (Batman Returns, Demolition Man), Heathers cast Winona Ryder in the lead role of Veronica Sawyer, a rebellious teenager whose attempts to separate herself from the elitist “Heathers” — a group of girls all named Heather — takes a dark turn when she becomes involved with J.D., a new student at the school played by Christian Slater. Kim Walker, Shannen Doherty, and Lisanne Falk played the three Heathers.
While the film was received well by critics and audiences, its disappointing box-office performance pushed it out of theaters relatively quickly. However, it became a massive hit when it hit the home-entertainment market, generating big sales as a rental movie. In 2006, Entertainment Weekly ranked Heathers the fifth best high-school movie of all time, and it was ranked No. 412 on a list of “The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time” by Empire magazine.
In 2010, a stage musical of Heathers was produced that ran off-Broadway through 2014 to critical praise and positive reviews.
The script for the Heathers television series will be penned by Butter and Marcel, Marcel screenwriter Jason Micallef. There’s no word on the timeline the network is envisioning for the series at this point.
