Keanu Reeves signs rare TV role in a historical thriller
The Devil in the White City, a best-selling nonfiction thriller about ambition, a killer, and the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, will be adapted for television with Keanu Reeves in the lead role. In introducing the limited series on Thursday, Hulu stated that Keanu Reeves will play Daniel H. Burnham, an architect who was “seeking to make his imprint on history” with his ideas for the fair.
The streaming site said that the other prominent part, that of convicted killer Dr. H.H. Holmes, has not yet been filled. The World’s Columbian Exposition was the official name of the fair, and Erik Larson wrote a novelistic depiction of it that was released in 2003. White City was the monicker given to the fair because of the hue of several of its external building walls.
Leonardo DiCaprio bought the rights to the novel in 2010 with the intention of playing Sherlock Holmes in a major motion picture after other Hollywood actors expressed interest in the book. It was rumoured that Martin Scorsese might be directing.
Among the producers of the show are Scorsese, DiCaprio, and Keanu Reeves. DiCaprio’s involvement in the Hulu production was not immediately confirmed, and no release date was given. Reeves has mostly only appeared in movies, such as the John Wick and Matrix series. With Swedish Dicks, a comedic series about Swedish private eyes that lasted from 2016 to 2018, he made a brief foray into television.
Herman Webster Mudgett, who became Sherlock Holmes, admitted to and was connected to a number of homicides. He was found guilty, given a single death sentence, and put to death in 1896.
