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Exclusive: A series based on the coming-of-age novel Long Division by Kiese Laymon is being developed by Trevor Noah’s Day Zero Productions.
The adaptation comes as it hires Chloe Ifshin as vice president of scripted television and Eugene Han as head of unscripted development, reorganizing its television executive team.
Through poetic language and satire, the book, which was published in 2021 by Simon & Schuster, explores family, hope, grief, love, and race.
It tells the coming-of-age stories of two Citoyen “City” Coldsons from Melahatchie, Mississippi, who lived in a coastal community at different times. One City takes place in 2013, when he has an on-stage meltdown during a nationally televised quiz contest. As a result, he becomes an overnight YouTube star and is sent to live with his grandmother in Melahatchie, where a young girl named Baize Shephard has gone missing recently.
Before leaving, City receives an odd book titled “Long Division,” which tells the story of a City Coldson in 1985. The truth about Baize’s disappearance is brought to light in the backyard of City’s grandmother, where the incredible cast of characters and stories of these two cities come together.
Along with Noah, Day Zero President Sanaz Yamin, Norman Aladjem, and Derek Van Pelt of Mainstay Entertainment, Laymon, a recipient of a MacArthur grant, will write the pilot and executive produce the series adaptation.
UTA brokered the deal, and Laymon is represented by PJ Mark at Janklow & Nesbit Associates. CAA, Mainstay Entertainment, and Hansen, Jacobson, Teller, and Hoberman represent Noah.
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