Center Stage TV Series in the Works From Sweet/Vicious EP
Jody Sawyer and her terrible turnout are about to pirouette into a new venue: the small screen.
A TV adaptation of the 2000 dance movie Center Stage is in development at Sony Pictures Television, our sister site Deadline reports. Sweet/Vicious creator Jennifer Kaytin Robinson is on board to write, executive-produce and direct the pilot.
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Laurence Mark, who produced the film and its two sequels — Center Stage: Turn It Up and Center Stage: On Pointe — also will produce the project, along with Temple Hill Entertainment.
Center Stage was released 20 years ago. The film follows a troupe of young ballet students at a prestigious New York City academy as they strive to get hired by dance companies around the world. It stars Zoe Saldana (Avatar), Amanda Schull (12 Monkeys), Susan May Pratt (Outcast), Peter Gallagher (Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist) and Eion Bailey (Once Upon a Time) as well as professional dancers Sascha Radetsky and Ethan Stiefel.
The TV series would continue the story begun in the movie, following a new class of dancers at the American Ballet Academy. But now Cooper Nielson — played by Stiefel in the film; no actors are yet attached to the series — is head of the ABA and the prestigious American Ballet Company. Remember how he wanted to shake things up in the ballet world back then? Given that the new class is described as “inclusive,” we’re betting that Nielson hasn’t changed his ways just because he’s taken Jonathan Reeves’ (Gallagher’s character) former position.
Are you doing jetés of joy about the possibility of seeing Center Stage on TV? Watch the film’s trailer below, then hit the comments!
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