Jessica Biel – whose career we have all been loosely following from 7th Heaven in the ’90s all the way to her more recent spins in The Sinner and as a guest in BoJack Horseman – is set to star in the latest podcast adaptation to hit your screens, Limetown, as Variety reports.
The hugely popular 2015 fiction podcast – a kind of cross between Serial and The X-Files – ‘investigated’ the disappearance of 300 people at a neuroscience research facility in Tennessee in 2005. It racked up over ten million downloads, reaching #1 on the Apple Podcasts charts.
In the series, Biel takes on the role of Lia Haddock, an American Public Radio journo, trying to find out what happened to the missing people. The podcast’s creators, Zack Akers and Skip Bronkie, have joined the project as writers. No news yet about the rest of the cast.
The ten-episode series is an original Facebook Watch production, meaning you can probably jam it all into your facehole on your phone when you’re on the bus. That’s convenient content consumption! The series joins two other dramas produced by the social media giant, including last month’s Sorry for Your Loss, starring Elizabeth Olsen.
A second series of the Limetown podcast begins on October 31, picking up where the first season left off, with a look into the people responsible for the facility, its disappearance and the resulting cover-up. MYSTERY. INTRIGUE. I NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS. I need to consume all of this content, nommnommnom.
If you too eat this shit up – you can’t wait for the Dirty John adaptation, you are subscribed to all the true crime podcasts, mystery stories hook ’em to my veins – then you’ll love PEDESTRIAN.TV‘s All Aussie Mystery Hour podcast. Subscribe on iTunes HERE, or on Spotify HERE. Or, you can just listen/download below.
And because this story is really having it’s moment rn, a Limetown prequel novel by Hurt People writer Cote Smith is due out in November through Simon & Schuster.
My heart is so warmed by how excited writer Akers is to see his humble podcast kick off like this – and how he really just wants to share his success with his mum:
We hoped people would listen, but I hadn’t written anything else in case no one did. The idea of it hurt too much. So we dropped the pilot on iTunes and did our best to tell everyone about it. Then Apple featured is in New & Noteworthy because someone heard it over there.
— Zack Akers? #WGAstrong (@zack_akers) October 8, 2018
Then we had to produce in real time. There was a rough draft of episode 2 and an outline for the season. Things had to kick into another gear. The next few months were the most insane and rewarding time of my life to that point, but we did it with the help of Super talents.
— Zack Akers? #WGAstrong (@zack_akers) October 8, 2018
Anyway, we did all that. The show was a hit that we didn’t expect. Our lives *have* changed a lot since we started. I got married. We got agents. We started the work of putting together a TV adaptation. I lost my mom. We didn’t know if the TV version was ever going to happen.
— Zack Akers? #WGAstrong (@zack_akers) October 8, 2018
It’s all insane and I know it will get more insane. I know there will be a lot of attention and a lot of hardships. I know there’s a lot of things to worry about.
But all I can think about is my mom and how crazy she would have been going right now. I miss her. I was so lucky.
— Zack Akers? #WGAstrong (@zack_akers) October 8, 2018
Anyway, all that to say this: thank you to everyone who has helped us, believed in us, supported us, loved us, followed us, yelled at us, motivated us—-we wouldn’t be here without you.
So now on with the show.
— Zack Akers? #WGAstrong (@zack_akers) October 8, 2018
Sorry gotta go binge listen a podcast now, you have a good day.
And if you’ve ever considered making a podcast of your own, we have 6 tips on how to get started.
