Netflix announced that it has picked up a new television series called The Get Down from Sony Pictures Television and director Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet, The Great Gatsby), which will premiere exclusively on the streaming provider next year.
Here’s the description:
The one-hour, 13-episode drama from Sony Pictures Television will focus on 1970s New York City – broken down and beaten up, violent, cash strapped — dying. Consigned to rubble, a rag-tag crew of South Bronx teenagers are nothings and nobodies with no one to shelter them – except each other, armed only with verbal games, improvised dance steps, some magic markers and spray cans. From Bronx tenements, to the SoHo art scene; from CBGBs to Studio 54 and even the glass towers of the just-built World Trade Center, The Get Down is a mythic saga of how New York at the brink of bankruptcy gave birth to hip-hop, punk and disco — told through the lives and music of the South Bronx kids who changed the city, and the world…forever.
“From his very first and magnificently original steps on the world stage with Strictly Ballroom to his most recent with The Great Gatsby, Baz conjures worlds we may not recognize initially, but once there, realize they are infused with the same dreams of every person – to belong, to matter, to live life to its fullest. We are thrilled to support Baz, Catherine and Paul and their team in their quest to illuminate those same dreams through the artists who came of age in the cauldron of the Bronx in the late 1970s,” said Cindy Holland, vice president of original content for Netflix.
Lhurmann added, “In this golden era of TV, the Netflix culture puts no constraint on creative possibilities. So it is a natural home for The Get Down, a project I have been contemplating and working on now for over 10 years. Throughout, I’ve been obsessed with the idea of how a city in its lowest moment, forgotten and half destroyed could give birth to such creativity and originality in music, art and culture. I’m thrilled to be working with my partners at Sony and collaborating with a team of extraordinary writers and musicians, many of whom grew up with and lived the story we’ve set out to tell.”
Luhrmann will direct the first two episodes and the season finale and serve as executive producer. Academy-Award winner Catherine Martin (The Great Gatsby, Moulin Rouge!), will serve as Costume and Production Designer and executive producer. Paul Watters, Thomas Kelly, Stephen Adley Guirgis, Shawn Ryan, and Marney Hochman will also serve as executive producers.
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