National Geographic has announced that astronaut drama The Right Stuff has been ordered to series after being in development since July 2017.
“The behind-the-scenes stories of the astronauts in Tom Wolfe’s bestseller The Right Stuff are engaging, provocative and timeless,” said Carolyn Bernstein, executive vice president, global scripted content and documentary films. “The book’s narrative aligns perfectly with the qualities that we look for in scripted projects: fact-based, wildly entertaining and pushing the limits of human achievement.”
Based on the best-selling Tom Wolfe non-fiction book of the same name, with Matt Lafferty (Castle Rock) showrunner and Academy Award winner Leonardo DiCaprio executive producing, The Right Stuff is described as a gritty look at the original Mercury Seven astronauts and how they and their families became instant celebrities as a result of their courage. Should the series be renewed, additional seasons carrying through to humankind’s greatest achievement: the moon landing.
The Right Stuff joins a scripted slate for National Geographic that includes Genius, Mars, and The Hot Zone. The series will be the second to take on the story of the Mercury Seven following ABC’s The Astronaut Wives Club while ranking as television’s only astronaut drama in the wake of Hulu cancelling Sean Penn’s The First.
