Netflix orders Lonesome Dove series from Zoe Kazan and Jeb Stuart.
Larry McMurtry’s 1986 novel has sold more than four million copies.
The 1989 miniseries starred Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones.
Netflix has given a straight-to-series order to the Lonesome Dove series, a new Western based on Larry McMurtry’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Zoe Kazan and Jeb Stuart, who are also working together on Netflix’s upcoming East of Eden, will serve as co-showrunners on the adaptation, with Teton Ridge Entertainment producing.
The project is being developed as an ongoing series and will revisit one of the most celebrated stories about the American West. It follows former Texas Rangers Gus McCrae and Woodrow Call as they embark on a perilous cattle drive from the Rio Grande towards Montana.
Lonesome Dove series brings McMurtry’s western back
The series will centre on the friendship between Gus and Call as they confront the dangers of the frontier while pursuing a dream that may already be slipping beyond their reach. The story combines adventure with themes of loyalty, longing, violence and the search for a meaningful life.
Teton Ridge Entertainment acquired the rights to the Lonesome Dove literary franchise earlier this year before bringing Kazan and Stuart on board to develop the adaptation.
Kazan and Stuart said in a joint statement that they were approaching McMurtry’s material with love and respect after their experience on East of Eden. They added that they were looking forward to bringing Gus, Call and the other characters to a new audience.
Netflix’s Lonesome Dove adaptation and its legacy
Netflix’s Jinny Howe said the decision to work with Kazan and Stuart again followed their collaboration on East of Eden. Their ability to handle character, setting and emotional storytelling was cited as a key reason for bringing them onto Lonesome Dove.
Jillian Share, president of Teton Ridge Entertainment, described McMurtry’s novel as a generational American story and said the adaptation would aim to retain the heart of the original while introducing it to a new generation.
Published in 1986, Lonesome Dove sold more than four million copies and spent 24 weeks on the hardcover New York Times bestseller list.
It was previously adapted into a celebrated 1989 CBS miniseries starring Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones, which won seven Emmys, two Golden Globes and a Peabody Award.
