THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY
plans for a screen adaptation
of Erik Larson’s book
Latest News
January 22, 2025: 20th Century Studios picks up The Devil in the White City as a feature film.
March 6, 2023: Hulu dropped plans to produce The Devil in the White City TV miniseries.
August 29, 2022: “According to a recent listing in Production Weekly, the series is reportedly scheduled to begin filming in March 2023 and will be filmed entirely in Chicago. Exact filming dates and locations have yet to be disclosed at this time.” [ReelChicago.com]
Development of Devil in the White City
A film adaptation of The Devil in the White City was first developed by Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner through their Cruise/Wagner company, but the option lapsed in 2004. Paramount acquired the film rights in 2007 and set it up with producers Michael Shamberg and Stacey Sher. Leonardo DiCaprio bought the film rights to The Devil in the White City in 2010 and began developing it as a feature film for Paramount studios to be directed by Martin Scorsese with DiCaprio was set to star in the leading role of the killer Holmes.
In 2019, the project changed to a big-budget miniseries for the streaming service Hulu. The series is being produced by Paramount TV Studios, ABC Signature, and Appian Way. Hulu canceled their plans in March 2023, but ABC Signature remains committed to the drama and will be shopping the show to new outlets.
Credits
Cast
Keanu Reeves as Daniel Burnham(confirmed 8/4/2022) (exited 10/7/2022)- Matt Damon?
- Robert Pattison?
Producers
- Sam Shaw (show runner)
- Leonardo DiCaprio
- Martin Scorsese
- Keanu Reeves
- Jennifer Davisson
- Rick Yorn
- Stacey Sher
- Lila Byock
Todd Field(exited 10/10/2022)- Mark Lafferty
- ? Emma Koskoff
Writers
Directors
Todd Field reportedly will direct the first two episodes. (out 10/10/2022)
More Information
Internet Movie Database (IMDB) page for the miniseries The Devil in the White City
Posts about Erik Larson’s 2003 book, The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America
January 2024 Trivia Question
Our seasonal newsletter includes a “Palmer Puzzler” exclusive to those who subscribe. (You can sign up here.) The first person to send us the correct answer wins a small prize. The January 2024 Trivia Question The Ceremonies for Closing Day of the 1893 World’s Fair, scheduled for October 30, were abruptly cancelled following the murder of Mayor Carter Harrison two days earlier. The celebration was to have ended with [...]
Feb. 10, 2024: “S. S. Christopher Columbus with Todd Gordon” (Plymouth, WI)
A program on the S.S. Christopher Columbus whaleback steamer, used to transport visitors to and from the 1893 World’s Fair, will be sponsored by the Sheboygan County Historical Research Center on Saturday, February 10, 2024. Part of the Center’s “Second Saturdays — Journeys Into Local History” series, “S. S. Christopher Columbus with Todd Gordon” will explore the history of the steamer that was built to ferry passengers from downtown [...]
159. Picturesque World’s Fair – The North Front of the Agriculture Building and Lawn
THE NORTH FRONT OF THE AGRICULTURE BUILDING, AND LAWN.—Between the magnificent Agriculture Building and the Grand Basin was a lawn not very broad, but nearly a thousand feet in length, resting the eye with its strip of green, and giving room for a just estimate of the architectural beauties displayed above. In the view given here is afforded not only a charming perspective of the Agriculture Building's graceful front, [...]
Christmas to a child
“The child dancing with life and delight all through the days before Christmas is a fair emblem of what society should be in the presence of coming events … The meeting of Nations in 1893, the meeting on the shores of Lake Michigan, the meeting in a young republic, the meeting in such a period of intelligence unite to compose an event which should be to all Americans more [...]
Doctor Who goes to the 1893 World’s Fair
If you could travel anywhere in space and time, what would be your destination? If there is a golden colossus, a giant rotating wheel, mammoth chocolate statues, and a tower of oranges involved, then get yourself to the Doctor. Doctor Who and the TARDIS take a trip the fairgrounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Max Kashevsky’s “All’s Fair” a new audio-drama included in the collection Doctor Who: [...]
Ron Soule’s “Escape from the Emerald City” imagines an origin story for Oz at the 1893 World’s Fair
Escape from the Emerald City by Ron Soule. Independently published, 2023. 105 pages. Hardcover, $14.95. ISBN 9798395968029. Paperback, $7.95. ISBN 9798395968111. In the growing library of “fairground fiction,” stories that involve historical figures offer a special treat to readers who enjoy imagining how famous (and soon-to-be-famous) people experienced the 1893 World’s Fair. A then-unknown traveling salesman from Chicago visited the fairgrounds on several occasions with his wife and four [...]
Did you see the 1893 Fair? Prove it with a “Certificate of Visitation to the World’s Columbian Exposition”
You bought your train ticket and booked your lodging in Chicago, traveled to Jackson Park and paid your fifty-cent admission. You’ve finally made it into the City of Wonders, the Dream City, the White City … the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition fairgrounds. How will anyone believe you are here if you don’t purchase an official “Certificate of Visitation” to show friends back home? T. Dart Walker’s drawing “In [...]
Tea from the Boston Tea Party at the 1893 World’s Fair
Two hundred and fifty years ago, on December 16, 1773, American colonists angry at the British crown for imposing taxation without representation, staged what became known as “The Boston Tea Party.” This act of colonial defiance to British rule has become a legendary part of American history, although aspects of the story are steeped in myth. Some of the tea from Boston Harbor appears to have made its way [...]
“A credit to Chicago’s wonderful pluck”: An Easterner’s take on the White City
This gracious comment about the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition comes a Connecticut man visiting the Fair in early May. [reprinted from “Noted by a Meriden Man: Jottings at the Big World’s Fair” Meriden (CT) Daily Republican May 6, 1893] The number, area and styles of the buildings on Jackson Park are astonishing and a credit to Chicago's wonderful pluck and executive ability. New York would never have poured out [...]
The Columbian Exposition, a Scintillating Diadem
Mr. Gerald James of London, puzzled by the discouraging impressions of the Fair reaching him through the New York press, came to Chicago to see for himself what the Exposition had to offer an open mind. “The Fair is supreme,” he wrote. “It is a scintillating diadem crowning the civilized world with the honor and glory of peace. It tells a story that centuries of books and newspapers could [...]