“Silk” screenwriter Peter Moffat is adapting Jonathan Freedland’s non-fiction novel “The Escape Artist,” which tells the true story of two Jews who escaped from Auschwitz.
Margery Bone’s Bonafide Films has secured the rights to Freedland’s novel, which is set to be made into a high-end limited series. Bonafide, who have a development and distribution deal with BBC Studios, recently produced Nicôle Lecky’s BAFTA-winning “Mood.”
“The Escape Artist” centers around nineteen-year-old Rudolf Vrba, a Slovakian Jew who manages to escape Auschwitz alongside fellow internee Fred Wetzler, and warn the world about what was happening. Their actions saved the lives of at least 200,000 Jews who were facing immediate deportation from Budapest to the world’s most notorious death camp.
“This is a story of how human beings can be pushed to the outer limits, and yet still somehow endure,” said Freeland. “How the actions of one individual, even a teenage boy, can bend the arc of history.”
Moffat and Freedland will exec produce alongside Bob Bookman, Jonny Geller, Margery Bone, Tom Dunbar and Zander Levy.
“Jonathan Freedland’s conclusion that Rudolf Vrba deserves to ‘stand alongside Anne Frank, Oskar Schindler and Primo Levi in the first rank of stories that define the Shoah,’ is hard to argue with,” said Moffat. “It’s a great privilege to be asked to adapt this profoundly moving work.”
Bone said: “We are thrilled to be working again with the immense talent that is Peter Moffat on this unique and important story. To bring Jonathan Freedland’s brilliant and meticulously researched book to the screen is an honour for all of us.”
Freedland is repped by Geller at Curtis Brown. Moffat is repped by Charles Walker at United Agents.
Nick Marston negotiated the film and TV rights for the book on behalf of Curtis Brown and James Jackson of JL Media on behalf of Bonafide.