US channel and studio group AMC Global Media has greenlit a drama series starring Dennis Quaid and set in the world of NASCAR, which was announced along with several other new programmes at an upfront presentation on Wednesday.
Thunder Road, produced by AMC Studios and NASCAR Studios, sees Quaid playing a racing legend who built a racing empire from a legacy of moonshine runs and dirt tracks and refuses to let it die.
It is created and executive produced by John Fusco (Young Guns, The Highwaymen), with Taylor Elmore (Justified, Tulsa King) serving as showrunner and exec producer. The show will premiere on cablenet AMC and streamer AMC+ in 2027.
AMC Studios has also opened a writers’ room for Bannerman, a drama based on John Maxim’s five-book series about a retired spy who finds himself being pulled back into the life he’s trying to escape.
The studio has put a TV adaptation of the 1991 crime thriller movie Point Break into development. Alcon Entertainment, which produced the original movie, is developing the series, with Dave Kalstein (Treadstone, Quantico, NCIS: Los Angeles) executive producing and penning the project. AMC said it “expects” to go into production in Australia later this year, ahead of a 2027 release.
It also provided an update on the adaptation of John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, which it announced last year. The AMC Studios project, which is part of a new anthology franchise built around great American stories, is expected to go into production early in 2027, with Rolin Jones and Brett C Leonard co-writing season one.
Elsewhere, AMC Global Media commissioned a new instalment of its sports docuseries Rise. The new instalment, from AMC Studios and Skydance Sports, examines how American football team the New Orleans Saints went from a displaced franchise to the heartbeat of a city struggling in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The three-part project will premiere on AMC and AMC+ in February 2027.
On the licensing front, AMC+ picked up the exclusive US streaming rights to YAGA, a Canadian mystery thriller that reimagines the myth of folklore figure Baba Yaga. The series was originally commissioned by Bell Media-owned streamer Crave and stars Carrie-Anne Moss (The Matrix), Noah Reid (Schitt’s Creek), Clark Backo (Letterkenny) and Hudson Williams (Heated Rivalry).