Spike, Paramount prep FBI drama

Tut was Spike’s first drama event order in eight years

US cablenet Spike is teaming up with Viacom stablemate Paramount Television for the first time, developing a drama from Gale Anne Hurd (The Walking Dead).

Pendergast is being developed with Universal Cable Productions (UCP) and is written by John McLaughlin (Black Swan), who exec produces alongside Hurd.

The show, based on the novels Relic and Cabinet of Curiosities, co-authored by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, follows an eccentric FBI special agent tasked with solving crimes in New York City.

The series marks the second coproduction between Paramount and UCP, with the firms previously working together on drama pilot Shooter.

Spike ordered Tut, its first scripted event series in eight years, last summer and has recently ordered Red Mars, based on Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars Trilogy.