Carl Mørck on four 'cases of special focus' for Denmark's Zentropa and TV2
Danish best-selling author Jussi Adler-Olsen [pictured] will deliver the next Nordic top investigator for the screen: Danish production outfit, Zentropa Entertainments, and commercial broadcaster TV2 have purchased his four novels of deputy detective superintendent Carl Mørck and Department Q for "cases of special focus", which they will film both for cinema and television.
"Both Adler-Olsen and Department Q are favourites of mine," explained Zentropa chief Peter Aalbæk Jensen, who has asked experienced producer Louise Vesth (Lars von Trier's Melancholia [+see also:
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Adler-Olsen's four Mørck novels, including The Woman in the Cage, aka Mercy (2007), The Pheasant Killers (2008), Message in a Bottle (2009) and Journal 64 (2010), have sold a total of six million copies in 32 countries - 1.3 million in Denmark alone.
Danish director Mikkel Nørgaard, who made Clown [+see also:
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"For some time we have been looking for a high-quality crime series with a big audience potential, and I am sure Adler-Olsen and Zentropa will supply it," said TV2 Programme Director Keld Reinicke about the station's so-far largest contract with a private production company.
Danish writer-director Nikolaj Arcel (whose A Royal Affair will be released next year) - and who co-scripted the first film in the Millennium trilogy, Men Who Hate Women (aka The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo [+see also:
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film profile]) - will pen the entire series.
Adler-Olsen is expected to launch the fifth novel of Mørck and his two assistants, the thoughtful immigrant Assad and the sharp-but-dysfunctional Rose, next summer. "I am sure Department Q has found its perfect platform for film and TV," he said.
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