The Body is now streaming on Netflix. All 8 episodes of the series from Quinn Shephard, the writer-director of Under the Bridge, went live at 1 AM MST this morning, and Netflix marked the moment with a short clip of the Lions dance team. Check out the official post down below:
The release post had passed 10,000 likes and 1.6 million views on X by this morning. Netflix counted down to the premiere with a post every hour, starting with "Six hours until The Body" at 7 PM MST last night and ending with "One hour until The Body" at midnight.
What The Body Is About
Netflix's official logline reads: "On Halloween night, an all-girls dance squad tumbles into Catholic guilt, unholy desires and ghostly visions when an initiation goes to hell." According to Netflix Tudum, the girls begin having prophetic visions after the initiation goes wrong, and those visions set off mass hysteria in their town.
The Lions are led by team captains Anya, played by Kristina Bogic, and Elise, played by Sara Boustany. The initiation is a drug-fueled ritual on their newest recruit, Grace, played by Sofia Wylie. "Prince of Darkness, take this most holy virgin sacrifice, and in exchange let us place at regionals!" Elise says during the ritual in the trailer. As Netflix's logline puts it, "The whole town starts asking the same question. What happened to Grace?"
Check out Netflix's post from the day before the premiere below:
Quinn Shephard On Making "Gritty Camp"
Shephard created The Body, serves as its showrunner and directed the premiere. She told Tudum how she would describe the show: "Tonally, I would describe the show as gritty camp. It's a raunchy teen psychodrama with a dash of Catholic horror."
The Body was Shephard's first TV script, written in her early 20s. "I started writing the show the year I came out," she said. She calls the series her "most personal" story and says it is "satirizing some of the trauma of growing up queer and repressed and the confusion around that."
Shephard named Carrie, Jennifer's Body, Heavenly Creatures and Mean Girls as inspirations, along with her teenage fixation on The Crucible and the Salem witch trials. "I love a spooky sense of mounting dread," she said. More on one of those inspirations is in Jennifer's Body 2: Megan Fox And Amanda Seyfried Set To Return For Karyn Kusama And Diablo Cody's Sequel.
The Body Cast And Producers
The series regulars are:
- Kristina Bogic as Anya Butler
- Sara Boustany as Elise Zakaria
- Geena Meszaros as Lisbeth Anderson
- Nnamdi Asomugha as Father Franklin
- Louisa Krause as Catherine Anderson
- Shirley Chen as Maddie Delaney
- Jackson Kelly as Leo Anderson
- Sofia Wylie as Grace Franklin
The Traitors winner Gabby Windey has a recurring role as Coach Miller, alongside Ashley Madekwe as Theresa Franklin, Marcel Ruiz as Tyler Santos, and Kyra and Phallon Pierce as Bailey and Brit Bradley. Shephard said this was Bogic's "first time doing an American accent," and described the young cast this way: "I love them, I feel like they're all my children, my coven."
Amy Israel, Peter Chernin and Josh Stern executive produce for North Road, with Riley Keough, Gina Gammell and Sacha Ben Harroche for Felix Culpa. It is a reunion for Shephard and Keough, who starred in and executive produced Under the Bridge. More on the series before its release is in Netflix's The Body Premieres In Nine Days With Anya's Perfect Cover.
The Body is rated TV-MA, and all 8 episodes are streaming on Netflix now.
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