Eli Roth (Hostel) will direct.
Hemlock Grove starts with the body of a young girl, mangled and murdered in the shadow of the former Godfrey steel mill. Some suspect an escapee from the White Tower, a biotech facility owned by the former steel magnates. Others believe the killer could be Peter, a 17-year-old Gypsy kid from the wrong side of the tracks, who tells his classmates he’s a werewolf. Or it could be Roman (Skarsgard), the arrogant Godfrey scion, whose sister Shelley is disturbingly deformed and whose mother, Olivia (Janssen), the otherworldly beautiful and controlling grand dame of Hemlock Grove.
As the crime goes unsolved and outlandish rumors mount, Peter and Roman decide to find the killer themselves, confronting unspeakable truths about themselves and Hemlock Grove as the mystery unfolds.
“Eli Roth is a master of this genre and Brian McGreevy’s brilliant novel gives Roth a world where he can create his magic,” said Ted Sarandos, Netflix Chief Content Officer. “Hemlock Grove is a sly blend of J.D. Salinger and Mary Shelley and will appeal to a broad base of fans captivated by these rich characters and stunning visuals.”
“I’ve been waiting for years to dive into television, and Eric Newman and I founded Arcade to do elevated genre projects exactly like Hemlock Grove. Brian McGreevy’s novel blew me away, and the material lends itself perfectly to long format storytelling. Hemlock Grove is smart, dark, complex, and at times terrifying,” said Eli Roth.
He added: “What’s most exciting to me is creating the series for Netflix, which as a feature filmmaker is like telling a story in a new medium. Netflix as a platform is the perfect hybrid of cinema, television, and social networking, with the creative freedom to go as dark as the story needs.”
The 13 episode first season of Hemlock Grove is Roth’s first foray into serialized drama as a director and executive producer.
