Shonda Rhimes Is Working on Eight Shows for Netflix – Today’s News: Our Take

Almost a year after announcing her surprising $300 million move to Netflix, Shonda Rhimes has unveiled her first slate of projects in development at the streamer under the Shondaland banner — and there’s eight of them.

Included among the eight projects are the Rhimes-penned adaptation of the recent New York Magazine article about con artist Anna Delvey, a documentary about the Debbie Allen Dance Academy’s award-winning production of The Nutcracker, and a take on the memoir of Ellen Pao, the former Reddit executive who filed a much discussed gender discrimination lawsuit against her employer.

“I wanted the new Shondaland to be a place where we expand the types of stories we tell, where my fellow talented creatives could thrive and make their best work and where we as a team come to the office each day filled with excitement,” said Rhimes. “Ted and Cindy and everyone at Netflix have been incredible partners in making that happen. This is Shondaland 2.0.”

The Netflix projects join Shondaland’s remaining ABC’s quartet of dramas, Grey’s Anatomy, How to Get Away with Murder, Station 19, and For the People. Under her contract, Rhimes will still work on those shows until they end, but any new series will be given to Netflix.

Initial summaries and working titles for each Netflix project are below:

Untitled Shonda Rhimes Project: Based on the New York Magazine article How Anna Delvey Tricked New York’s Party People by Jessica Pressler. Manhattan makes a new friend like no other. But is she the stuff American dreams are made of or is she New York’s biggest con woman? Is it a con if you enjoy being taken?

Untitled Bridgerton Project: Based on Julia Quinn’s best-selling series of novels about the lives of women and men in London’s high society marriage mart as told through the eyes of the powerful Bridgerton family. Scandal‘s Chris Van Dusen adapts.

The Warmth of Other Suns: Based on Pulitzer-Prize winning author Isabel Wilkerson’s award-winning book of the same name, the series will track the decades-long migration of African-Americans fleeing the Jim Crow South in search of a better life in the North and the West between 1916 and 1970. National Humanities Medal recipient, MacArthur Genius Grant recipient and 2-time Drama Desk winning playwright Anna Deavere Smith is set to adapt.

Pico & Sepulveda: Created by Emmy-award winner Janet Lehay, this period piece is set in 1840s California, then a state of Mexico. It follows the end of an idyllic era there as American forces threaten brutality and war at the border to claim this breathtaking land for its own.

Reset: My Fight for Inclusion and Lasting Change: Netflix and Shondaland have acquired the rights to Ellen Pao’s groundbreaking memoir detailing her life and career, including the lawsuit she brought against her former employer that sparked intense media scrutiny, shook Silicon Valley to its boys’ club core and pre-saged the Time’s Up movement.

The Residence: Based on Kate Andersen Brower’s 2015 nonfiction book The Residence: Inside the Private World of the White House, which offers a vividly accurate insider’s account of White House residence staffers and the upstairs-downstairs lives they share with the First Families at one of the most famous homes in history. No writer has been announced.

Sunshine Scouts: Writer/actress Jill Alexander will shepherd this darkly comedic half-hour series where an apocalyptic disaster spares a rag-tag group of teenage girls at sleepaway camp who must then summon their moxie and survival skills to weather the fallout and ensure all that remains of humanity abides by the Sunshine Scout Law.

Hot Chocolate Nutcracker: Directed by Scandal‘s Oliver Bokelberg his documentary offers a behind-the-scenes look at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy’s award-winning reimagining of the classic ballet, The Nutcracker. This staged contemporization — with its inclusive cast of all ages and its blend of dance traditions — has further cemented Debbie Allen’s legacy as one of the greatest forces for good in dance.