NBC is turning The Great Gatsby into a cop show — and Nick Carraway is now a woman
NBC is hauling 'The Great Gatsby' into the present day — and the way they’re doing it might raise an eyebrow or two.
Right, so things are getting a bit wild in the land of classic literature meets modern telly, and this time it's The Great Gatsby being taken for a spin. And not just another cinematic jaunt, like that 2013 Baz Luhrmann spectacle with DiCaprio throwing champagne about, but something a fair bit stranger: NBC reckon it’s time for Gatsby, the emblem of Jazz Age excess, to become a modern police procedural.
Gatsby hasn’t had a proper telly adaptation since a single episode of CBS’ Playhouse 90 aired back in 1956.
Gatsby: Detectives, Not Dandies
Here’s the gist. The new series is simply titled Gatsby, and NBC have got Jake Coburn and Jason Tracey steering the ship as writers and executive producers. But this isn’t your gran’s Gatsby—no speakeasies, no bootleggers, not even the endless garden parties (as far as we know). Instead, Jay Gatsby is recast as a detective—no, really—a charming one, naturally, who seems to be very good at reading people. There’s still a Nick Carraway, sort of, except now Nick’s not even a bloke. The long-time narrator and neighbour in the original novel gets gender-swapped; she’s now Nicky, still with writerly ambitions, but these days she happens to be a decorated New York State Police detective as well. That’s quite a pivot from bond salesman-with-writerly-dreams next door.
The last proper Gatsby made-for-TV version was in 1956; this is the first new series adaptation in seven decades.
Adaptation, but Not as We Know It
If you’re getting déjà vu because Gatsby’s been filmed before—yes, the novel’s seen Broadway, Hollywood, and a string of smaller screen versions, but NBC's take is not just updating the wallpaper. Apparently the Nick-to-Nicky swap is a first for any major adaptation, and it’s decidedly a procedural now, not a brooding meditation on lost dreams and excess. Let’s just say, sure to get certain people frothing online.
As for the folks behind it: Jake Coburn’s about as NBC as you can get. He’s co-showrunner for The Hunting Party, worked on The Endgame, and has credits on everything from Gossip Girl and Quantico to Arrow. He’s even written YA novels that have won an award or two. Jason Tracey, on the other hand, has his fingerprints all over American telly; he recently produced RJ Decker for ABC, was in charge of CSI: Vegas, and was a mainstay on Elementary for its full run, plus various stints on Burn Notice, Justice, and Cold Case. Basically, procedural telly is their wheelhouse.
No word yet on casting, air date, or how they’ll fit green lights and tragic pool deaths into a format where the main job is catching crooks. But considering all that’s changing, if this thing gets picked up, it could be the mad Gatsby remix nobody was expecting—or asking for, truth be told.