The Wild Boars are headed from the Tham Luang Nang Non cave and to the small screen, Netflix inked to debut a mini-series about the harrowing cave rescue.
The deal for the project was unveiled Thursday by Thailand’s Culture Ministry, which revealed that the streaming giant had partnered with Crazy Rich Asians producer SK Global to co-produce a miniseries to tell the story of 12 young Thai soccer players and their 25-year-old coach who became trapped in a flooded cave over the summer.
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“The series will be produced by Hollywood’s SK Global Entertainment, which has been granted lifetime rights to contact the 13 young members of the Wild Boars football team,” Thailand government spokesman Lt-General Werachon Sukondhapatipak said, according to Deadline.
Sukondhapatipak added that all 13 members of the Wild Boars soccer team will be paid around $94,000 for their involvement in the mini-series, which will explore the events leading up to the soccer team becoming trapped in the cave system and the subsequent rescue mission, which involved NAVY Seals leading the team out after more than two weeks of being trapped underground.
“We can confirm that we are working on an original scripted miniseries with SKE Global and 13 Tham Luang Company Limited to bring the incredible story of the Thai cave rescue to audiences worldwide on Netflix,” Netflix said of the mini-series.
The rescue mission of the 12 boys, aged 11 to 16, and their soccer coach had not only captured worldwide attention as it played out, but had also sparked interest in Hollywood before the Wild Boars and their coach were even brought back to the ground. SK Global had even previously discussed making a feature film about the rescue through its Ivanhoe Pictures division, the production banner behind Jon Chu’s 2018 hit romantic comedy Crazy Rich Asians.
In July, it was said that Ivanhoe Pictures was in talks “with senior officials in Thailand both on provincial and national levels” and reportedly had “multiple studios who have shown interest about this project.”
Others in talks at the time for potential movie adaptations included projects from Warner Brothers, Universal, Christian film and television studio Pure Flix Entertainment, and an indie film, The Cave, from Thai-Irish director Tom Waller.
Of those potential adaptations, only The Cave, which is set to focus on the rescue from the perspective of the rescuers, has gone into production. The film shot last year and is now in post-production.
