TV

Elisabeth Moss is Ruling Our TV Screens

Following her producing role on The Handmaid’s Tale, Elisabeth Moss will follow-up with Fever.
By  · Published on May 25th, 2017

Following her producing role on The Handmaid’s Tale, Elisabeth Moss will follow-up with Fever.

Elisabeth Moss‘ career has traversed through the evolution of television in Western society. From her role as Zoey Bartlet on the political talk-and-walk drama The West Wing to arguably one of Mad Men‘s best characters Peggy Olson, Moss has consistently played complex and interesting characters. Yet, before around 2012, when streaming services and shows like Game of Thrones were beginning to make their cultural impacts, there was a clear lack of female characters.

Whilst there’s still a gendered and race disparity, women are increasingly getting more coverage in front of and behind the character. Viewers saw the improvement this year with Reese Witherspoon’s production company Type A Films, which produced the Witherspoon, Laura Dern, Shailene Woodley, and Nicole Kidman -starring HBO drama Big Little Lies. CBS’ trailer for the Star Trek: Discovery series has been met with excitement and joy online, largely thanks to Sonequa Martin’s starring role. And American Gods is redefining the boundaries and limitations of sexuality on screen.

Moss’ work is clearly a part of television’s changing of the course. Just this year alone Moss has starred in and produced the adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s feminist dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, and will soon be seen in the second series of Jane Campion’s Top of the Lake (which just premiered at Cannes).

Now, Moss is set to star in and executive produce a miniseries with Annapurna Television and BBC America. Called Fever, the series adapts the 1999 novel of the same name written by Mary Beth Keane. The novel focuses on “Typhoid Mary,” the first-known carrier of typhoid fever, who spread the disease across 20th century New York. As Moss herself observesFever‘s protagonist is “incredibly complicated, something I seem to enjoy playing.”

Moss acquired the rights to Keane’s book. The actress sent the material to director Phil Morrison (Junebug), who is set to direct and serve as an executive producer on the miniseries. Set to write the adaptation is Robin Veith, who has written episodes of True Blood and Mad Men. Veith and Annapurna’s Sue Naegle and Megan Ellison will also serve as executive producers alongside Moss and Morrison.

All that’s left to ask is, what will Moss do next as ruler of modern-day television?

 

Related Topics: , , ,

Freelance writer based in the UK.