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Sister Pictures has acquired the television rights for writer and comedian Adam Kay’s debut This is Going To Hurt: Secret Diaries Of A Junior Doctor in a 12-way auction.
The Picador title, published on Thursday (7th September), was signed by Naomi De Pear of Sister Pictures from Cathryn Summerhayes, Amanda Davis, Jessica Cooper and Kat Buckle at Curtis Brown after the auction. The series will be written by Adam Kay and developed by Katie Carpenter and De Pear, who will executive produce the series.
This is Going To Hurt is Kay's diary during the six years he spent as a junior doctor between 2004 and 2010, proving a "blistering" first-hand account of life working for the NHS "in all its joy, pain, sacrifice, hilarity, horror and maddening bureaucracy". Kay used his experiences to inform his sell-out show which ran at the Edinburgh Festival and then at Soho Theatre and is an award-winning writer for TV and film, too, with credits including "Mongrels", "Mrs Browns Boys", "Mitchell and Webb" and "Very British Problems".
“I couldn't be happier about working with Sister to bring This is Going to Hurt to television," he said of the deal. "Jane, Naomi, Katie and the whole team are fantastic, with a brilliant vision for the show, and a hard and rightly won reputation for producing world-class television. I'll try my best not to ruin their reputation.”
De Pear, who developed "Apple Tree Yard" and also heads up comedy label Hootenanny, said she had snorted with laughter and been left completely heartbroken while reading the book.
She called it "a visceral and hilarious reminder of how brave, ridiculous, beautiful and stupid human beings and the systems they create are", and added: "We’re honoured to be able to work with Adam on adapting his vision for television. The NHS is a magnificent beast and it's imperative that this story be told now."
Among Sister Pictures' other current projects is the TV adaptation of award-winning Naomi Alderman’s novel The Power.