ATLANTA — Peacock’s “Teacup” by title alone sounds like a 19th century “Bridgerton” drama with gaudy costumes and sexual intrigue.
But it’s actually a slow burn sci-fi horror series based loosely on the novel “Stinger” by Robert R. McCammon. A family and their neighbors find themselves trapped (in a “teacup” metaphorically) on a farm in rural Georgia facing a mysterious and deadly threat.
The show premiered earlier this month, and it’s clear there is some force impacting humans and animals and it is not remotely normal.
The eight-episode series, covering just 48 hours of storytelling, was shot earlier this year at both Assembly Studios in Doraville and an expansive 124-acre farm in Suwanee.
“The beauty of shooting in Georgia is it became like the sixth man of the show with all that the Georgia environment gives cinematically,” said Rob Morgan, who plays McNab, a justifiably paranoid man who seems to know what is actually happening. “The show was able to take advantage of that.”
Yvonne Strahovski (“The Handmaid’s Tale”), who plays Maggie Chenoweth, a coolheaded large-animal veterinarian and loving mom of two kids, said the show was blessed to shoot in the spring. “Deer visited us every day at sunset,” she said. “The weather was perfect.”
But “Teacup” is hardly tranquil. Maggie is grappling with fresh news that her husband James (Scott Speedman) cheated on her. Then an even more serious crisis quickly arises: electricity flickers, then goes out. Cellphones stop working. Animals act strangely. Dead bodies show up. Conspiracies loom. Trust evaporates.
Their son Arlo chases a stray farm goat into the woods and returns different, possessed perhaps. Two families arrive, one with a sick horse and another missing their dog. McNab, in a chemical respirator, pops up and creates a border line around the Chenoweth property using spray paint, holding a sign “Don’t trust anyone.”
Ian McCulloch, the producer and showrunner, .told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the book “Teacup” is based on is more along the lines of a massive high-budget sci-fi thriller but his show is nothing like that.
“What if we took this book and flipped it on its head,” McCulloch said. “What if we took big and made it small? What if we took a cast of dozens and made it three families? What if we took a town and made it a secluded farm? What if we took away 90 percent of the characters and stuck with the core idea, the core characters and it still works?”
