Prime Videohas released the first trailer for theirCruel Intentionstelevision series, featuring plenty of references to the original film. Released in 1999,Cruel Intentionswas a retelling of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos' 1782 novelLes Liaisons dangereuses,which was famously adapted in 1988 as the filmDangerous Liaisons.Cruel Intentions, however, moves the setting to a wealthy high school in New York City and starsSarah Michelle Gellar,Ryan Phillippe,Reese Witherspoon, andSelma Blair, all of which are still big names today. The movie is so popular it even got atheatrical re-release in 2019 to celebrate its 20th anniversary.
The firsttrailer forCruel Intentionshas been released, confirming theseries premiere date for June 07, 2025. The trailer features plenty of callbacks to the original 1999 film, fromrecreating the iconic same-sex kissto a cover of the Verve’s “Bittersweet Symphony,” which famously played in the film’s ending scene. The series looks to keep the same premise of the original, with the characters' names changed as the step-siblings are now Caroline Merteuil (Sarah Catherine Hook) and Lucien Belmont (Zac Burgess). However, notably, it does feature a more explicit sexual dynamic between step-siblings, which was only alluded to in the original film.
Cruel Intentionswas originally developed for Amazon Freevee when it was announced in 2021, but in 2023,it was moved to Prime Video. Phoebe Fisher and Sara Goodman will serve as the series showrunners and executive producers.Cruel Intentionsis the second ’90s movie starring Sarah Michelle Gellar that Fisher and Goodman brought to the small screen. Previously, the duo worked on theI Know What You Did Last Summertelevision show that also aired on Amazon Prime Video in 2021.
There Have Been Several Failed Attempts At Adapting Cruel Intentions To Television
The road to aCruel Intentionstelevision show has been a long one. After the surprise hit of the 1999 film, a prequel television series namedManchester Prepwas ordered by Fox but was canceled before it was broadcast, while the two finished episodes were reworked into a direct-to-video sequel,Cruel Intentions 2, in 2000 and later followed byCruel Intentions 3in 2004. In 2016, NBC ordered a pilot for another attempt at theCruel Intentionstelevision series. This series would have been a continuation of the 1999 film and would have seenSarah Michelle Gellar reprise her role asKathryn Merteuil. NBC passed on the pilot. Finally,Cruel Intentionsreturns eight years after the last television attempt and 25 years since the original film.
How Cruel Intentions Paved the Way for Saltburn 25 Years Ago
Cruel Intentions' aesthetic of individuals using sex, seduction, and status as leverage became some of the inspiration for Emerald Fennel’s Saltburn.
Cruel Intentionsis the latest in many films about bullying that have been reimagined into television shows. There was the infamous attempt to rebootHeathersas a television show in 2018 that was surrounded by controversy. It was recently confirmed thatMike Flannagin would be developing aCarrielimited seriesbased on the Stephen King novel, which was previously adapted into a movie in both 1976 and 2013.Cruel Intentionslooks to be giving the surface-level updates needed for the series, but whether it will be able to capture a young generation the same way that the original film did back in 1999 remains to be seen.
