Bill Hader is back at HBO. Per Variety and confirmed by IndieWire, the “Barry” creator is co-writing a series about Jonestown, AKA the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project founded by cult leader Jim Jones.
Hader will serve as co-showrunner with “Damages” creator Daniel Zelman. The duo will also executive produce, with Hader set to direct should the project move forward at HBO. A source told IndieWire that Hader could potentially star in the series as Jones as well.
Jones founded the Peoples Temple in 1955 and established Jonestown in Guyana in 1974. Jones and more than 900 members of his Peoples Temple died in a murder-suicide by drinking Flavor Aid (not, as has become the saying, Kool-Aid) laced with cyanide at Jonestown in 1978.
“Saturday Night Live” alum Hader won two Emmys for Best Actor in a Comedy for dramedy “Barry.” The series itself garnered 16 total Emmy nominations for writer/director/creator Hader across its four seasons. “Barry” bowed in 2023.
Hader’s Jonestown series co-creator Zelman previously co-created FX series “Damages” starring Glenn Close. He later developed Netflix series “Bloodline,” and served as a consulting producer on “Succession.”
This Jonestown project is separate from the series that “Breaking Bad” creator Vince Gilligan was developing at HBO in 2016. Leonardo DiCaprio previously executive produced docuseries “Jonestown” for Sundance TV in 2018. The actor/producer was later announced to lead MGM biopic “Jim Jones” in 2021.
Hader said in 2023 that he had three projects in the works after “Barry,” including a “Barry”-esque horror film. Hader, whose tone for the Jonestown series has yet to be classified in any genre, previously told IndieWire that as a director, he thinks it is crucial to have a “very clear idea” of scenes.
“It’s really hard as an actor when the director doesn’t know what they want and you’re presenting ideas to them and they’re going ‘not that, not that.’ That, to me, is not really directing,” he said. “I get frustrated with directors like that as an actor. So I always want to be very clear with what I want, and then we’re working together to get there and I’m just being a cheerleader and a good audience. If someone does something funny, I genuinely laugh. Or if it’s emotional, I tell them, ‘Oh my God, that was great.’ I think the biggest thing with actors is that they just don’t want to look like idiots. … The biggest thing you do for an actor is just be encouraging and let them do their thing, and then kind of guide them.”
Additional reporting by Brian Welk.
