Jake Gyllenhaal Partners With AE

The Oscar-nominated actor and producer Jake Gyllenhaal is getting into the television.

Gyllenhaal, who recently played in the movie ‘Everest’, and his Nine Stories Productions is teaming with A&E to develop limited anthology series that is focused on American cults.

The announcement was made by the Executive Vice President and Head of Programming for A&E Elaine Frontain Bryant at the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour.

The series will explore a different major cult personality and the provocative nature of belief each season. Season 1 would focus on the notorious story of Jim Jones and his cult The Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ. The series would chronicle Jones’ path from social leader and passionate integrationist to deranged spiritual dictator over a group of followers committed to his dangerous philosophy of faith, culminating in a mass murder-suicide in which 918 people died at the group’s Guyana compound in November 1978.

Speaking of the project, Gyllenhaal said: “Riva and I founded Nine Stories to push creative limits, and have found a wonderful partner in A&E with this fascinating series.

“Jim Jones is a complex character — one who has found his way into the collective unconscious.  We want to focus on the undeniable magnatism of zealots and the danger of that kind of charisma. A notion not only pertinent to cult leaders but to the geo-political climate of today.”

A+E Networks will handle global sales for the series.

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