Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

Dollhouse and Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Eliza Dushku has been cast as Patricia Holm, the female lead in the latest TV version of Leslie Charteris’ Robin Hood of Modern Crime, Simon Templar, alias The Saint.

Hunted’s Adam Rayner will play Simon in the backdoor pilot, set to start shooting later this month in Los Angeles, Toronto and London. Con Air‘s Simon West is directing from a script by Jesse Alexander; Saint expert Ian Dickerson is acting as creative consultant. Roger Moore and his son Geoffrey are co-producers on the project.

The Saint first appeared in the novel Meet The Tiger! in 1928, with over fifty books following over the next 55 years, some of which have as yet only appeared in French. Numerous actors have taken the role on radio, TV and film, with Roger Moore’s 1960s incarnation encountering giant ants in the creepy installment The House on Dragon’s Rock, and a SPECTRE-like organisation in The Fiction Makers. Ian Ogilvy, Simon Dutton and Val Kilmer are the most recent screen versions, with Being Human’s Paul Rhys playing the part for three well-received radio adaptations of Charteris’ stories, including The Last Hero, another crossover into the fantasy genre.

No network is yet attached to the pilot.