Elisabeth Moss Developing Typhoid Mary Mini for BBC America

BBC America is working with Elisabeth Moss and Annapurna Television on developing the period drama Fever.

Based on Mary Beth Keane’s novel of the same name, the limited series is set to star Moss (The Handmaid’s Tale, Top of the Lake), who holds the rights to the novel and will also serve as an executive producer on the project. Fever tells the story of the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever in the early 20th century in New York who became known as “Typhoid Mary.”

Phil Morrison (Enlightened, Junebug) is on board as director and executive producer. Robin Veith (The Expanse, True Blood) is currently set to write the adaptation and will also serve as an executive producer alongside Moss, Morrison and Annapurna’s Sue Naegle and Megan Ellison.

Moss said: “I’m so honored to be working with the incredible team of collaborators we have pulled together with Phil, Robin, BBC America and Annapurna. I look forward to telling this story about one of the most infamous women in America, ‘Typhoid Mary,’ a woman whose true tale has never been told. She was an immigrant in turn-of-the-century New York, a time of huge change and progress in America. She was incredibly unique, stubborn, ambitious and in fierce denial of any wrongdoing until her death [before which] she lived out her days imprisoned on an island just off of the Bronx in N.Y. She is incredibly complicated, something I seem to enjoy playing.”