Charlie Huston’s The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death for HBO

I either missed this when it came out or I didn’t process it at the time. Either way this is old at this point. Alan Ball, a producer who gets things done (True Blood, Six Feet
Under), gave the following quote in an interview in the Sydney Morning Herald back in November.

”I’m developing a pilot based on a novel by Charlie Huston who’s kindof a noir writer. It’s a book called The Mystic Arts of Erasing All
Signs of Death. He’s writing the script and I’m overseeing it as producer.”

This is great news with a lot of potential. For obvious reasons the Joe Pitt books wouldn’t work at HBO, but The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death (which was the subject of an edition of The Electric Mayhem) has a vibrant sub-culture begging to be explored with an almost secondary world feel to it. Plus, the characters are probably Huston’s most sympathetic, empathetic and human yet. What actor wouldn’t want to play Web?

One of the hallmarks of Charlie Huston’s writing style is a near total lack of exposition with relevant information largely revealed through dialogue. This style lends itself easily to a script without much adaptation or loss.

Charlie Huston’s stock has been on the rise from day 1, and if HBO catches the Huston wave now they could be looking at a huge hit.