This is USA Network's first new scripted series in a while as part of a planned relaunch as a destination for original scripts. The network currently shares Chucky with Syfy, which is about to renew season four. It is also in advanced negotiations to pick up Syfy's Resident Alien, which is set to become a USA Network Original.
The Rainmaker is likely part of the Blue Sky brand that USA Network wants to revive with new series. That programming initiative, unveiled last fall, involves developing hour-long series with a budget of $2 million to $3 million per episode, recognizing the economic realities of basic cable, which has been hit hard by cord-cutting and the overall decline in linear viewing. The budget for The Rainmaker is reported to be at the higher end of that range.
In The Rainmaker, Rudy Baylor, a recent law school graduate, battles court tiger Leo Drummond and his law school girlfriend. Rudy, together with his boss and her disheveled assistant, discover two conspiracies surrounding the mysterious death of their client's son.
USA's Blue Sky era included legal series like Suits and Fairly Legal.
The Rainmaker was originally part of an innovative two-series drama project based on two Grisham novels, 1995's The Rainmaker and 2015's Rogue Lawyer, which launched at Hulu in 2018. The project, for which Seitzman teamed up with writer-producer Jason Richman, was intended to be the first chapter in a larger franchise, tentatively titled The Grisham Universe.
The duo, who at the time were both under deals at ABC Studios, put together a writers' room, with Seitzman focusing primarily on The Rainmaker and Richman on Rogue Lawyer.
The idea, which may have been too ambitious, fell through. When Seitzman got the scripts back, he split them into two separate series. He now collaborated with Blumhouse Television on further development of The Rainmaker, which was brought to Lionsgate by Jason Blum after his company recently partnered with the indie studio on a multi-picture deal to reimagine horror classics from the Lionsgate library.
Seitzman, Lionsgate TV and Blumhouse TV pulled the project from the market and chose USA Network, with The Rainmaker as the cornerstone of the new scripted series and the network open to building a larger universe with success.
Seitzman and Richman wrote the script for the pilot, with Seitzman writing the series. The two produce alongside Grisham, Blum and David Gernert.
The 1997 film The Rainmaker (pictured above), written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola based on Grisham's novel, stars Matt Damon, Claire Danes, Jon Voight, Mary Kay Place, Mickey Rourke, Danny DeVito, Danny Glover, Roy Scheider, Virginia Madsen and Teresa Wright star.
