EXCLUSIVE: Avatar Entertainment has acquired rights to Spanish journalist Vicente Vallés’ novel Hunting the Executioner (La Caza del Ejecutor).
The London- and L.A.-based production and management company and content financier has attached screenwriters Borja Moreno and Pablo Riquelme Cuartero to adapt the book into an eight-part TV shows. Avatar founder Larry Robinson is executive producing the project. No streamer or network attached at this stage.
Hunting the Executioner follows a handsome American CIA agent who partners with a beautiful Spanish secret agent as they travel the world trying to identify and neutralize a mysterious assassin killing western spies throughout the world.
This is the second novel written by journalist Vallés, a veteran newscaster who anchors the evening news on Spanish broadcaster Antena 3. His previous novel Operation Kazan was once set up at Universal Television, though the story involving a Russian-backed U.S. Presidential candidate ultimately was put into turnaround. Moreno and Cuartero had been hired by Universal to it.
Robinson, who spoke to Deadline in Cannes at MIPCOM said: “I am excited to work with the legendary Vicente Vallés, Pablo Riquelme Cuartero and Borja Moreno to develop this exciting book into a super premium action thriller series that could air around the world.”
The news comes Avatar signed an agreement for the rights to the Katy Hogan novel Out of the Darkness, Robert Enright’s bestselling Sam Pope action book series, and Mary Dearborn’s biography of Ernest Hemingway for a TV adaptation.
Moreno and Riquelme Cuartero are managed by Avatar, while Vallés’ novel is published by Editorial Espasa part of Grupo Planeta. Robinson and Avatar are repped by CAA.