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Peacock orders supernatural mystery series 'St. Donatus'
The project hails from Ringer co-creators, Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder.
Peacock continues to shore up its growing roster of original television content with St. Donatus.
As Deadline reports, the streaming service has entered development on the supernatural mystery series hailing from Ringer co-creators, Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder. The title refers to a small Iowa town harboring a dangerous secret. "An unwitting family, relocating from Brooklyn, moved into a newly-renovated farmhouse on the outskirts of town. When the family starts experiencing unsettling occurrences, it brings them closer to the town’s secret… and the very thing trapped in their cellar," reads the synopsis.
Sean Hayes, Todd Milliner, and Richard Shepard will executive produce alongside Charmelo and Snyder. Shepard is also on board to direct, having previously worked with the creators on Ringer and The Perfection. He confirmed his involvement with the project on Twitter, describing it as "truly bonkers." Charmelo and Snyder — who signed an overall production deal with Universal Television in 2016 — are no strangers to the world of genre television, given their writing/producing experience on The CW's Supernatural.
In 2019, the duo began work on Brain Trust (an adaptation of Carol Riggs novel, The Body Institute) for NBC. While there haven't been any major updates on the show since its announcement a little over three years ago, the show is said to center around a group of graduate students who invent technology that allows a person to project their mind into someone else's body.
"We've always been self-generators," Snyder remarked in 2020. "We like coming up with our own ideas, we like seeing our words come to life, we like being bosses in the sense of wanting to make sure that your vision is properly executed. From the thought in the writers' room or the night before, to when you pitch it to your writers, to when it airs. You just want to make sure you've got it right and I think that sort of passion is what you need to take on that job, which is all-consuming."
"I think, first and foremost, we consider ourselves storytellers," echoed Charmelo. "Quite frankly, if we weren't doing this, what the f*** would we do? We don't want to be teachers, so I'm thinking that's like 80 percent of the answer: just feeling compelled to say something; to not necessary be provocative, but we have something to say about society in general. I made home movies that I was writing and acting in and directing since I was six. This was the early '80s, the dawn of the VHS recorders at home. My dad had gotten one and it was probably 35 pounds, so it was probably half my body weight. I would lug it around and make horror movies with my sister and her friends. I always felt compelled to tell stories."
