Firebird Options Weldon's 'Puffball' for TV
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- Firebird Pictures has optioned Fay Weldon's 1980 novel Puffball for television, with no network or cast yet attached, marking the second screen adaptation after Roeg's 2007 film starring Kelly Reilly, Donald Sutherland and Miranda Richardson.
- Morgan Lloyd Malcolm is set to write the adaptation; she won the Olivier Award for her play Emilia and previously wrote Netflix's Obsession starring Richard Armitage, as well as psychological film The Wasp with Naomie Harris and Natalie Dormer.
- Fay Weldon died in 2023 after publishing more than 30 novels; her other adapted works include The Life and Loves of a She-Devil, made into a film with Meryl Streep and Roseanne Barr and a separate BBC series.
- Puffball centers on a young London couple whose farming neighbor Mabs drugs Liffey with an herbal aphrodisiac and sends her husband to sleep with her, then turns vengeful when Liffey conceives while Mabs cannot.
- Firebird Pictures is backed by BBC Studios and recently came off BBC's Wild Cherry by Nicôle Lecky, while currently producing Wahala for the same network with a cast including Cush Jumbo, Adelayo Adedayo, Deborah Ayorinde and Susan Wokoma.
Why it matters: Weldon's catalog has long fed prestige British screen adaptations, and Firebird's BBC Studios pipeline gives Puffball a credible route to a UK network—though the project currently has no network attachment. Landing Morgan Lloyd Malcolm, an Olivier winner with a Netflix thriller credit, signals Firebird is pitching this as elevated genre drama rather than a quick cash-in on the 2007 film's cult following.
