Neil Gaiman Neverwhere Sequel Coming to Radio

Earlier this year Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere was adapted into a radio drama which was broadcast by BBC Radio 4. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch, James McAvoy, David Harewood and Natalie Dormer it was an immediate hit with listeners and now a spin off of the series is imminent. 

Neil has said on his Facebook page that the programme which will be broadcast in early November and will be made available to listeners for a month afterwards will be able to be heard around the globe via the internet even for those who are too far away for Radio 4 to reach them.

The audio drama which is called How the Marquis Got His Coat Back will star Adrian Lester, Mitch Benn and Don Warrington among others and will follow Neverwhere’s Marquis de Carabas as he searches for his legendary garment in the alternate-London realm of London Below, the magical setting for Neverwhere. As a bonus Hollywood star James McAvoy, who played the lead, Richard Mayhew, in the original 2012 adaptation has returned to aid the Marquis in his latest adventure. As if that wasn’t enough, Neil Gaiman himself is set to star in the adaptation, playing a character called The Boatman who will ferry The Marquis and his guide across Mortlake, the River of the Dead.

In an exclusive interview with The Radio Times he confessed that up until the Neverwhere adaptation he’d had no plans to expand upon the world of London Below, but on hearing the drama thought ‘I wish there was more of this!’ And I decided, ‘Oh, I’d better go and make some more of this’.
He added: “The Marquis is probably the most fun character I’ve ever written. He is always unpredictable, he is conniving, he is unreliable. He is… especially in Neverwhere, we see him from the outside. So I thought, it would be fun to see him from the inside. It would be fun to watch what happens when we’re actually following the Marquis on a usual day! I mean, a usual day for him seems to involve the threat of him losing his life, several old enmities coming back, brainwashing and some unwanted family relationships. Plus, having to wear a poncho.”

Directed by Neverwhere and Good Omens’s Dirk Maggs How the Marquis Got His Coat Back will be followed by another adaptation of Gaiman’s novels, Stardust later in the year.