national Arts Festival Banner

Thursday, November 2, 2017

THE HANDMAID’S TALE ON M-NET




Having picked up a whopping 8 Emmy Awards just last month, the critically acclaimed drama The Handmaid’s Tale is now running on M-Net channel 101. With its powerhouse female cast, haunting visuals and contemporary themes, the series was renewed for a second season just days after season one’s first three episodes premiered.

Based on the celebrated novel of the same name from author Margaret Atwood, and starring the talented Elisabeth Moss, the psychological drama is centred in a dystopian Republic called Gilead, a totalitarian society that was formerly part of the United States. Twisted by religious fundamentalism, environmental disasters and plunging birth rates, the government treats women as property of the state meaning that the few remaining fertile women in the Republic are assigned to households as ‘Handmaids’ and are forced into sexual servitude as a last desperate attempt to repopulate a devastated world.

The gripping story is explored through the eyes of one such Handmaid, Offred, who is assigned to the household of a Commander and his forbidding wife. In this terrifying society where one wrong word could end her life, where anyone could be a spy for Gilead, Offred navigates between Commanders, their cruel Wives, domestic Marthas, and her fellow Handmaids, all with one goal: to survive and find the daughter that was taken from her when the Republic first came to be.

Acclaimed author Margaret Atwood had a cameo in the first episode of the drama, and serves as a producer on the show alongside Elisabeth Moss. The series stars Elisabeth Moss (The West Wing, Mad Men, Top of the Lake), Joseph Fiennes (American Horror Story, Camelot), Yvonne Strahovski (Chuck, Dexter, 24: Live Another Day) Alexis Bledel (Gilmore Girls, Mad Men) Madeline Brewer (Orange is The New Black, Grimm) Ann Dowd (The Leftovers, Quarry) O T Fagbenle (Looking, The Five), Max Minghella (The Mindy Project) and Samira Wiley (Orange is The New Black, You're the Worst).

The series was created by Bruce Miller and is executive produced by Ilene Chaiken, Warren Littlefield, Bruce Miller, Reed Morano, Fran Sears and Daniel Wilson.

For more information on The Handmaid’s Tale visit mnet.tv. Follow the conversation with M-Net on Twitter @MNet (#HandmaidsTale and #MNet101) and on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MNet/