AESOP

Genres:   History, adventure, fantasy, romance, war, bromance.

Format: TV Series: Pilot, Bible, Novel.
Comps: Merlin, Game of Thrones, I Claudius.
Tagline:   The fables were only the beginning.

Logline: The rise of the African storyteller of Aesop’s fables from his beginnings as a slave to the second-in-command of the richest warrior prince in history.

In 585 BCE, the Lydians, warriors from Asia Minor with a passion for storytelling, battle the East for the world while their Greek neighbors try to stay out of their fight.

When rumors of an exceptional storyteller reaches Thales, the first Greek philosopher, he buys and educates the African slave, Aesop, and gives the young storyteller to the Lydian King in exchange for an agreement to leave the Greeks in peace.

At a court banquet, Aesop tells his fable, The Tortoise and the Hare, impressing the Lydian prince, Croesus, who befriends Aesop and supports him to become the court storyteller.

The next day, Aesop overhears Croesus’s half-brother plotting murder and rushes to a ceremony where a structure has been made unstable.  When he can’t get Croesus’s attention, he tackles the royal party as the structure collapses, saving their lives.

The prince gathers his army to go after the half-brother who’s fled the city. Aesop joins the prince on his campaign as his friend and companion and their adventures begin.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Aesop is known worldwide.  The morals of his fables are imprinted in our psyche. Appearances are deceiving.  United we stand, divided we fall.  Familiarity breeds contempt. No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted. Don’t cry wolf.  Very few people, however, know that the man who wrote those phrases is more interesting than his fables.

Croesus, the archetypical hero, is lusty, beautiful and complicated.  One of the richest (“rich as Croesus”) and most beloved kings in history, his friendship with his storyteller, his acceptance of someone so different from himself, is why we know about Aesop today.

The story is, at its heart, a bromance between two unlikely best friends, their adventures, battles, romances and creative pursuits in the empire they rule and how, at the end, they try to hold on to it as the world closes in on them.

There’s enough material to generate as many episodes as can be produced and, when the series ends, there’s a shocking finale to leave the audience wanting more.

For more information: contact