Audrey Niffenegger's romantic fantasy novel The Time Traveller's Wife has already hit cinemas in 2009, with the film starring Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana. Now, though, Doctor Who/Sherlock's Steven Moffatt is at work on a TV drama version for HBO.
Niffenegger's 2003 book follows Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who has a genetic disorder that makes him travel involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist who falls in love with him and has to deal with his condition. Henry and Clare’s passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap.
"I read Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveler’s Wife many years ago, and I fell in love with it. In fact, I wrote a Doctor Who episode called The Girl In The Fireplace as a direct response to it," Moffat says. "When, in her next novel, Audrey had a character watching that very episode, I realized she was probably on to me. All these years later, the chance to adapt the novel itself, is a dream come true. The brave new world of long form television is now ready for this kind of depth and complexity. It’s a story of happy ever after – but not necessarily in that order."
It's not the first time that the book has been in development for TV; US broadcast network ABC worked up a pilot in 2009. Moffat, though, will fare better given his straight-to-series order. He'll produce alongside Sue Vertue and Brian Minchin.
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