Paramount is teaming with Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Jennifer Todd's Pearl Street Films banner for The Shadows, the story of America’s first detectives.
Chris Bremner is behind the pitch, which the studio acquired, and will now write the script for what will be a period thriller.
Based on the Matthew Pearl’s Boston Globe Magazine article "Into the Shadows," the project will tell the story of the country's first undercover officers, which were first organized in Boston, the hometown of Damon and Affleck.
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In the late 1840s, Boston was a growing town of almost 140,000 but only had 30 police officers and 150 patrolmen, according to the account. With crime rampant, the mayor gave the nod to the creation of a task force known as "The Shadows," the first police force to work with criminal informants, wear plain clothes and go undercover. The group revolutionized law enforcement as it blurred the lines between right and wrong amidst the xenophobia and hysteria of the nation’s first great immigration wave.
Pearl Street last produced Kenneth Lonergan's Oscar-winning drama Manchester by the Sea and the period crime drama Live by Night, which Affleck directed. Todd was also a producer on this year's Academy Awards and is working on next year's show.
Bremner is currently working on the script for Sony's Bad Boys 3 and is co-writing director Dan Trachtenberg's Harry Houdini biopic, Houdini, with writer Noah Oppenheim (Jackie). He previously penned the 2015 Black List script Black Friars, which was picked up by Lakeshore.
Bremner is repped by UTA, Kaplan Perrone and Bloom Hergott.