Prime Video’s Cruel Intentions: Everything we know so far

Cruel Intentions will be released on Prime Video on November 21, 2024. The streaming platform released the first trailer of the series on October 24, 2024. The new series is based on the cult classic 1999 film Cruel Intentions starring Sarah Michelle Geller, Ryan Phillipe, Reese Witherspoon and Selma Blair.

Privilege and power reign in elite halls at Manchester College in Washington, D.C., as the stepsiblings, Caroline Merteuil (Sarah Catherine Hook), and Lucien Belmont (Zac Burgess), navigate through seduction and deception when an infamous hazing scandal is set to upend their social dominance.

To stay at the conference, they will have to kidnap the innocent daughter of the U.S. Vice President, Annie Grover (Savannah Lee Smith). In this film, John Harlan Kim, Khobe Clark, Brooke Lena Johnson and Sean Patrick Thomas, one of the lead actors in the first movie feature alongside.

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What was the Cruel Intentions film all about?

The 1999 film Cruel Intentions, directed by Roger Kumble, brings the 1782 French novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses into the modern American high school. Appropriately, it stars Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillippe as wealthy, manipulative stepsiblings Kathryn and Sebastian, who make a dark wager.

To prove his skills at manipulation, Sebastian must seduce Annette, the virginal daughter of their school's headmaster also played by Reese Witherspoon. This time with a mix of seduction, betrayal, and moral ambiguity.

With a talented young cast that included Selma Blair, Joshua Jackson, and Tara Reid, in addition to the leads, it became a cult classic because of its daring, provocative storyline and catchy soundtrack, which included Bitter Sweet Symphony by The Verve. Though panned by most critics, it is indeed a box office smash domestically and internationally, making an estimated $75 million worldwide on a budget of only $10.9 million.

Manchester Prep, a TV series prequel, was also in development and was considered too explicit and re-issued as Cruel Intentions 2 with young Amy Adams in Gellar's part. A direct-to-video sequel cropped up, as well as Gellar for a 2015 pilot which was not ordered to series.

Cruel Intentions stays a ripe franchise for it inspired new series by Sara Goodman and Phoebe Fisher as Sony Pictures Television and Amazon MGM Studios created.

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What is the plot of the Cruel Intentions series?

The new adaptation centers its setting on the ruthless social battles at Manchester College, a prestigious college in Washington, D.C., where sororities and fraternities uphold a strict social hierarchy.

The drama's heart is two stepsiblings, Caroline Merteuil and Lucien Belmont, who will stop at little to keep their tenuous positions atop this frequently cruel class. However, when violence threatens to upend the entire Greek community on campus, the self-interest of this unlikely duo must be set aside, so they must take any action they can to maintain the reins and the status quo.

But as they decide to maintain control, Caroline and Lucien end up indoctrinating innocent Annie Grover, the daughter of the Vice President of the United States into their manipulation games. In this game of power and reputation where everything that counts must be seen to have been achieved, they spin a tapestry of seduction and deception, testing the limits of friendships and loyalties at the elite student circle of Manchester College.

Manchester College gets the modern-day royal re-dressing with the deepest secrets, broken hearts, and ruthless pursuit of status in this high-stakes adaptation.

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The cast of Cruel Intentions series on Prime Video

Here are the details of the cast members of the upcoming series.

• Sarah Catherine Hook as Caroline Merteuil
• Zac Burgess as Lucien Belmont
• Khobe Clarke as Scott
• Brooke Lena Johnson as Scott
• Sara Silva as CeCe Carroway
• John Harlan Kim as Blaise
• Savannah Lee Smith as Annie Grover
• Sean Patrick Thomas as Professor Chadwick
• Laura Benanti as Claudia, Caroline's mother
• Jon Tenney as U.S. Congressman Russell
• Claire Forlani
• Nikki Crawford
• Isabella Tagliati
• Zeke Goodman

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Cruel Intentions will be released on Amazon Prime Video on November 21, 2024.