Gray

A contemporary reimaging of the classic Oscar Wilde novel, “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” Gray is a supernatural revenge thriller about an alluring but violent woman, Dorian Gray, who seeks vengeance on a cabal of powerful men who wronged her years ago; and of the straight-laced African American detective with a past of his own, who is tasked with stopping her.

The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde’s only novel and one of the classics of gothic literature, is the tale of the most beautiful man of his age, who sells his soul and his conscience in exchange for eternal youth, beauty and power — and who spends his life murdering, raping and corrupting. All the time in his attic, his picture degrades and rots.
GRAY takes that basic idea but flips its moral framework and gender archetypes: our DORIAN GRAY is a Millennial social media princess who drifts through the coolest cliques of NYC, breaking hearts and turning heads wherever she goes. But Dorian has secrets. For one thing, she’s a violent criminal. For another, she’s an immortal creature of magic, who commits violent burglaries and assaults some of New York’s most powerful men.
30 years ago, whilst an innocent student, Dorian was sexually assaulted by these men. In that moment that she became something both more and less than human. 30 years later, but not a day older, she’s ready for her revenge. Then Dorian meets Detective HANK WUTAN, the African-American NYPD detective assigned to stop these crimes, struggling with his own loyalties as a Black cop in the era of Defund the Police. Despite the fact that Dorian is his suspect number one, and he is effectively working for her abusers, they fall for each other, hard.
GRAY takes Wilde’s classic novel and reinvents it as a tale of cathartic revenge for the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter era, a violent fantasy about how powerful, super-rich white men don’t always win, how the powerless can find justice, and about how a murderous demon and a law-abiding detective can be soul mates.

A graphic novel from Clover Press, by the mind behind Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Darkness Visible, and Jagged Little Pill on Broadway, GRAY is a reimagined, modern feminist, politically charged update on Oscar Wilde’s A Picture of Dorian Gray.

In simultaneous release with the graphic novel, Arvind Ethan David is producing a full audiobook drama, with a press and media push to promote. This titillating dramatic adaptation will star powerhouse Broadway and TV star Laren Patten as Dorian (Jagged Little Pill, Blue Bloods), seasoned favorite Neil Brown Jr as Detective Hank (Straight Outta Comption, Insecure, SEAL Team), Emmy & SAG Award-Winner Richard Schiff as Hank’s partner Detective Bracknall (The West Wing, Ballers, The Good Doctor), leading man Samuel Barnett as Baron Arnheim (Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Penny Dreadful), and directed by the dually talented Milena Govich (FBI, Finding Carter, Rescue Me), who will also play Baroness Lauren Arnheim.