Ryan Murphy Goes Inside the Making of ‘The Shards,’ Reveals Multi-Season Plan
Ryan Murphy has spoken to The Hollywood Reporter about the making of "The Shards," his FX adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis's 2023 autofiction horror novel, revealing that he and Ellis have plotted the story out across three planned seasons. The project matters to Murphy personally, as the 1981 Los Angeles setting mirrors his own coming-of-age year, and he says invoking that shared generational experience with Ellis, whose earlier HBO adaptation had fallen through, was key to winning the rights after years of trying.
The series, which premiered on Wednesday with the first two of nine episodes, stars Igby Rigney as the Ellis-inspired protagonist Bret, alongside Kaia Gerber, Homer Gere, Evan Rachel Wood and Wes Bentley. Murphy told THR that casting was intensive, with roughly 500 actors seen for the roles, and described the shoot as an emotionally demanding production. He also discussed how the show handles the novel's eroticism and confirmed that a multi-season arc had been envisaged with Ellis from the outset.
- Ryan Murphy's FX series "The Shards" adapts Bret Easton Ellis's 2023 novel.
- Murphy and Ellis have planned a three-season story arc.
- Show premiered Wednesday; cast saw about 500 actors audition.
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Ryan Murphy is the veteran television producer behind hit shows such as "Glee," "American Horror Story" and "Feud," known for turning literary or true-crime source material into ambitious limited series. "The Shards" is his new FX adaptation of a 2023 novel by Bret Easton Ellis, an American author who came to fame in the 1980s with books such as "Less Than Zero" that captured a bleak, glamorous vision of youth in Los Angeles. The novel blends autobiography and horror, following a version of Ellis himself as a teenager in 1981.
Murphy has reportedly wanted to bring Ellis's work to screen for years, and the two men share a personal connection to the story's setting, as 1981 was also a formative year for Murphy. An earlier attempt to adapt the book for HBO had previously stalled before Murphy secured the rights. The series stars Igby Rigney as the young Bret, alongside actors including Kaia Gerber, Homer Gere, Evan Rachel Wood and Wes Bentley.
The show matters because it represents a significant new venture from one of American television's most prominent creators, adapting a divisive literary work known for its dark and sexually explicit content. It has been planned from the outset as a multi-season story rather than a single instalment, and its first episodes have just begun airing on FX.