BBC lands A24’s ‘Shuggie Bain’ adaptation, with Douglas Stuart attached to write

Douglas Stuart

BBC One is adapting Douglas Stuart’s 2020 Booker Prize-winning novel Shuggie Bain for TV, with Euphoria’s A24 attached to produce.

Stuart is attached to write the series, which will also be known as Shuggie Bain, with Gaynor Holmes exec producing for the BBC.

A24 will handle sales as well as production, with the commission coming six months since former BBC drama chief Piers Wenger left the pubcaster to head up the UK expansion of the US firm.

The novel is set during the 1980s and tracks the life of a boy and his mother struggling to survive in Glasgow, Scotland. Based on Stuart’s own childhood, the show will follow Shuggie’s mother Agnes, who dreams of improving her family’s life but finds increasing solace in drink, using benefits payments to do so.

“To Shuggie, an effeminate boy who struggles to fit in, Agnes is his guiding light. He cares for her as she battles with alcoholism while he struggles to become the normal boy he desperately longs to be,” the BBC said, adding the seweries would be “a powerful portrayal of a working-class family with a very important story to tell.”

Stuart said: “I’m thrilled to bring the Bain family to the screen and the opportunity to expand on my novel and to bring new threads to the story, exploring hardships and struggles as well as the compassion, humour, and resilience that is so central to the Scottish spirit.”

Holmes, commissioning editor for BBC Drama, said: “Shuggie Bain is an extraordinary novel, with all the makings of extraordinary television. It’s a real honour to be working with the immensely talented Douglas Stuart to bring his vision to the BBC.”