Nahnatchka Khan Inks First-Look Deal With Universal TV, Sets ‘Killer Potential’ Series Adaptation

Nellie Andreeva
·2-min read

EXCLUSIVE: Nahnatchka Khan is staying at Universal Television, the studio behind her upcoming Peacock comedy series Laid. Khan, who is coming off a four-year overall deal at Universal TV, has closed a first-look pact with the studio, a division of Universal Studio Group.

Under the multi-year deal, Khan will continue to create, develop, write, supervise and produce new projects for network, cable and streaming via her production company, Fierce Baby Productions. That includes series Killer Potential, based on the upcoming debut novel by Hannah Deitch, which is currently in development.

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Fierce Baby and Universal TV won the rights to the book, which will be published in March 2025 by William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins, in a competitive, multi-studio bidding war.

Khan and Deitch will co-write the adaptation. The series follows two unlikely fugitives — an overeducated and broke SAT tutor who finds her rich employers brutally murdered in their backyard and the mute woman she discovers trapped in the walls of their mansion.

Killer Potential fits into Fierce Baby Prods.’ focus on amplifying new voices and perspectives in comedy and drama.

Jennifer Carreras serves as Head of Television and Chloe Yellin is the Head of Film of the company, which is currently in production on Laid. Khan and Sally Bradford McKenna are writers, executive producers and co-showrunners; Khan is directing six of its eight episodes.

Set to debut later this year, Laid, based on the Australian series of the same name created by Marieke Hardy and Kirsty Fisher and produced by Liz Watts, stars Stephanie Hsu as a woman who finds out her former lovers are dying in unusual ways and must go back through her sex timeline to confront her past in order to move forward. Davis Entertainment and Hsu also executive produce.

On the feature side, Khan recently directed the 2023 Amazon film Totally Killer, executive produced by Fierce Baby, which debuted as #1 on Prime Video in its opening weekend. Fierce Baby, along with Davis Entertainment, also is producing the romantic comedy movie Dial A for Aunties, which Netflix landed in a bidding war. Khan is set to direct the film from a script by Natalie Krinsky and Kourtney Kang.

Khan’s new Universal TV deal comes amid a rising popularity of first-look pacts as an alternative to pricier and more restrictive overall agreements. Under her overall deal with Universal TV, Khan served as creator, executive producer and co-showrunner on the studio’s NBC comedy series Young Rock, which followed the early years of Dwayne Johnson.

Prior to joining NBCUniversal, Khan created and executive produced the ABC’s Fresh Off the Boat and Don’t Trust the B—- In Apartment 23. She is repped by UTA and Johnson Shapiro Slewett & Kole.

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