Variety is reporting that actress Cara Delevingne (Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets) has signed on to play the female lead in Amazon‘s fantasy noir series, “Carnival Row“. She will play Vignette Stonemoss, a fairy who trades in secrets and is constantly dealing with prejudice towards non-humankind. She joins the recently-cast Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Caribbean), who is play Rycroft Philostrate, a police investigator tasked with solving the death of a fairy showgirl.
The show is set within the neo-Victorian metropolis known as The Burgue. It is a city filled with mythical creatures who have found themselves refugees from their original war-torn lands. The Burgue has now become a powder keg of racial and economic tension between said mythical beings and the humans who also reside there.
This is a project that has been kicking around for well over a decade. It was previously set up as a film at various studios under the title A Killing on Carnival Row, with directors such as Guillermo Del Toro (Hellboy) and Neil Jordan (Interview with the Vampire) previously attached to direct. Not long ago, original screenwriter Travis Beacham (Pacific Rim) decided to repackage it as a television series, eventually setting it up at Amazon.
“Carnival Row” is set for an 8-episode first season, which will shoot this fall. The series is not expected to premiere on Amazon until early 2019. Beacham will produce, alongside Rene Echevarria (“Star Trek: Deep Space Nine“) and Paul McGuigan (Gangster No. 1). The latter will helm the show’s pilot.
