Neverwhere
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Neverwhere is an urban fantasy television series by Neil Gaiman. The series is set in 'London Below', a magical realm coexisting with the London familiar to all. It was later adapted into a novel.
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The TV series
The plot of Neverwhere centres around Richard Mayhew, an average Londoner who encounters an injured girl named Door. With her he enters the world of 'London Below', whose inhabitants are generally invisible to regular Londoners.
In London Below the various familiar names of London all take on a new significance: thus "Knight's Bridge" is a real and dangerous bridge; the Angel Islington is an actual Angel.
NeverWhere was first broadcast on BBC Two from September 12 1996. There are six half-hour episodes:
- Door
- Knight's Bridge
- Earl's Court To Islington
- Blackfriars
- Down Street
- As Above, So Below
Primary Cast:
- Gary Bakewell - Richard Mayhew
- Laura Fraser - Door
- Hywel Bennett - Mr. Croup
- Clive Russell - Mr. Vandemar
- Paterson Joseph - The Marquis de Carabas
- Trevor Peacock - Old Bailey
The six episodes were released to DVD as a two-disc set on September 9, 2003.
The novel
The novel was written after the series and was released in the UK by the BBC ISBN 0747266689 and from Avon Books ISBN 0380789019 in July 1997.
For a book based on a TV series, it is considered to be surprisingly good, perhaps because it was written by Neil Gaiman himself, and might be described as an adaptation of the series as he would have preferred it, without the compromises required by budget restrictions, intrusive network executives, and so on.
Other adaptations and sequels
Rumours of both a feature film adaptation and a sequel to the original story have been circulating since the original release. A script has been written for a movie version and was optioned by the Jim Henson Company, but the project has been through so many script and directorial changes that it may well be designated as lost in development hell. Neil Gaiman has given a sequel to the book a definite maybe.