The man behind one of the best documentaries made about The Troubles is also involved. This should be excellent.
Fresh from his most recent success on the critically-acclaimed Season 2 of Narcos: Mexico, Eric Newman isn't resting on his laurels because he's got quite a busy schedule ahead.
After telling JOE about his ideas for the
next season of Narcos and the potential for setting the show in
another country, Newman's to-do list is getting even bigger, but after focusing on the drugs trade in Mexico and Colombia in Narcos, he's now looking at the modern drug crisis in the US.
Newman is set to team up with Peter Berg (director of Friday Night Lights, Deepwater Horizon) and Alex Gibney (No Stone Unturned, The Armstrong Lie, Going Clear) for a new Netflix drama examining the opioid crisis in the US.
The drama is based on The New Yorker article, The Family That Built an Empire of Pain, by Patrick Radden Keefe and the book Pain Killer: An Empire of Deceit and the Origin of America’s Opioid Epidemic by Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist and author Barry Meier, both of which will serve as the main material for the series.
The talent involved is quite impressive because Berg has shown he's a director that can combine visual flair with a knack for character and storytelling. Elsewhere, if you haven't seen
No Stone Unturned - Alex Gibney's superb documentary on the unsolved 1994 Loughinisland massacre, where six Irishmen were murdered - then you need to amend that immediately.
In a statement released to
Deadline, Newman spoke candidly about what drew him to this story: “A tragedy decades in the making, the opioid crisis has become one of the most devastating public health crises of our time.
"Unlike other drug epidemics, born from underground manufacturing and covert smuggling, this epidemic began by prescription — dispensed by doctors, approved by government regulators and promoted by a family-owned pharmaceutical giant that made billions while betraying the trust of patients and the public."
With the names involved here, this is bound to be good.
