#with David and Jeremy both having magazine spreads this week

[cinema-tv-etc]

Station Eleven

Station Eleven is a 2014 novel by Emily St. John Mandel.[1][2][3] It is Mandel's fourth novel. The novel takes place in the Great Lakes region before and after a fictional swine flu pandemic, known as the "Georgia Flu", has devastated the world, killing most of the population. It won the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 2015.[4]

The novel was well received by critics, with praise emphasizing the understated nature of Mandel's writing. It appeared on several end-of-year lists as one of the best novels of 2014.

Plot summary

During a production of King Lear at the Elgin Theatre in Toronto, Jeevan watches as the actor playing Lear, Arthur Leander, has a heart attack. Since he has begun training as a paramedic, Jeevan tries to resuscitate Arthur, but is unsuccessful. Instead, he comforts one of the child actors in the production, Kirsten. After leaving the play, Jeevan goes for a walk in the snow and receives a call from his friend, a doctor. He warns Jeevan to get out of the city as the mysterious Georgia Flu is spreading rapidly and will soon become a full-blown pandemic. Jeevan loads up on supplies and goes to stay with his paraplegic brother. Many of the actors, actresses, and others that had gathered to mourn Arthur's death die within the next three weeks.

Twenty years later, Kirsten is part of a nomadic group of actors and musicians known as the Travelling Symphony. Kirsten, who was eight at the time of outbreak, can remember little of her life before Year Zero, but clings to a two-volume set of graphic novels given to her by Arthur before his death, titled Dr. Eleven. The troupe operates on a two-year cycle touring the Great Lakes region, performing Shakespeare plays and classical music, while Kirsten scavenges abandoned homes for props, costumes, and traces of Arthur in tabloid magazines.

The troupe intends to reunite with two members they left behind - the pregnant Charlie, and her husband, Jeremy - at a small town. Upon arriving, they are disturbed to find that their friends are missing, and the town is now under the control of the Prophet, who rapes the young girls he claims as his "wives". The troupe quickly leaves town, and goes off-route to the 'Museum of Civilization', a settlement where they believe they might find their missing friends. However, en route, they discover a young stowaway who fled the town, as she was promised to the Prophet as his bride. Shortly after, members of the troupe begin to disappear until finally the entire troupe is gone, leaving only Kirsten and her friend August. Frightened, they continue on to the Museum hoping to be reunited with others.

Unbeknownst to Kirsten, the graphic novel Dr. Eleven is an unpublished passion project by Arthur's first wife, Miranda. Fourteen years before the collapse of civilization, Miranda left an abusive relationship and married Arthur. As Arthur's fame as an actor hit its peak, Miranda realized he was having an affair with the woman who would become his second wife, Elizabeth. The night that Miranda discovers the affair, she walks out of her home and asks a paparazzo outside if he has a cigarette. The paparazzo turns out to be Jeevan. Years later, when Jeevan is trying to reinvent himself as an entertainment journalist, Arthur gives him an exclusive interview; he is leaving Elizabeth and their young son, Tyler, to be with another woman. Jeevan reflects on this while he and his brother Frank are quarantining in Frank's apartment. After weeks, they realize that no one is coming to save them. Frank, a paraplegic, commits suicide so Jeevan doesn't feel responsible for him. Jeevan embarks on a journey south, and after many years, finds a new settlement where he marries and becomes the town doctor.

In Year Zero, one of Arthur's friends, Clark, informs Elizabeth that Arthur is dead. Clark, Elizabeth and her son Tyler, happen to be on the same flight from New York City to Toronto to attend Arthur's funeral, until it is grounded at the Severn City Airport due to the pandemic. The passengers, having nowhere to go, create a settlement in the airport, and Clark becomes the "curator" of the Museum of Civilization, where he gathers artifacts such as iPhones and laptop computers. While most of the airport survivors adapt to their new life, Elizabeth and Tyler embrace religious zealotry, believing that the pandemic happened for a reason and spared those who were good. After two years, they leave with a religious cult.

In the present, Kirsten and August find a group of the Prophet's men holding Sayid, a member of their troupe, hostage. They kill the men and free Sayid, who explains that their friend Dieter was killed, while another hostage escaped, warned the troupe, and sent them on another road, explaining how they went missing. Kirsten, August, and Sayid leave for the Severn City Airport, but Kirsten is soon discovered by the Prophet himself. Just before he is about to kill her, he refers to the "Undersea," a place from the Dr. Eleven comics. Kirsten quotes lines from Dr. Eleven, distracting the Prophet long enough that a younger sentry (having a crisis of faith) shoots and kills him, before taking his own life. The trio continues to the Museum of Civilization where they are reunited with Charlie, Jeremy and the rest of the troupe. Clark, who has lived in the museum for twenty years, realizes who Kirsten is, her attachment to Arthur, and that the Prophet was Tyler Leander. Clark takes Kirsten up to the watch tower of the airport, where there is a town to the south with electric lights, showing that civilization is beginning to take root again.

Five weeks later, Kirsten leaves with the Travelling Symphony for the town to the south. She gives one copy of Dr. Eleven to Clark's museum, as he begins to read it and recognizes a scene that is borrowed from a dinner party which he, Arthur and Miranda once attended.

A film adaptation of the novel is in development by Scott Steindorff.[

On October 18, 2019, it was announced that Station Eleven would be adapted into a 10-episode miniseries that will premiere on HBO Max. Hiro Murai is set to direct, with Patrick Somerville as showrunner and writer. They will both also serve as executive producers alongside Scott Steindorff, Scott Delman, and Dylan Russell. The miniseries will star Mackenzie Davis as Kirsten and Himesh Patel as Jeevan. Gael García Bernal has been cast as Arthur, and David Wilmot as Clark.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Station_Eleven