NBC has ordered a full season of the new Jekyll and Hyde adaptation.
Do No Harm is a serial following the story of Dr. Jeffery Kohl, a world-class neurosurgeon who has bungled up his own brain. At night, he becomes Ian Prince, a brooding bad boy who cares not for the desires of Dr. Kohl.
Both parts will be played by Steven Pasquale, known for his role on Denis Leary’s Rescue Me.
The interesting part? The network describes the show as a ‘medical drama,’ which likely means the focus of the show is going to be the action of the hospital – in this case: Independence Memorial in Maine.
The protagonist will be dealing with diagnosing and healing the patients, while running the gamut of hospital politics. His alter ego is simply a complication of that greater plot, rather than the focus of the story.
Nevertheless, I’m sure there will be secret-keeping, lying and relationship sabotaging, along with other melodrama caused by the existence of Prince.
The last attempt to adapt Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde for a television serial was less than successful. As you may recall, the BBC’s Jekyll only lasted one season back in 2007, despite being pretty good from a literary perspective.
To be fair, it was originally planned as a mini-series, so it wasn’t a big surprise that the show didn’t continue, even if it had a lot of great talent behind it, like star James Nesbitt and showrunner Steven Moffat, who has since become famous for bringing Doctor Who to US audiences after taking over the show from previous showrunner Russell T. Davies.
There was also a US show with a somewhat Jekyllish character, but My Own Worst Enemy, also only one season long, took quite a different approach, and if it was even intended as a Jekyll and Hyde interpretation, it was very loose..
Do No Harm will premiere this fall on NBC.
