Netflix Nabs ‘American Royals’ YA Drama From ‘Red, White & Royal Blue’ Co-Writer Ted Malawer & Alloy Based On Books

EXCLUSIVE: What if America had a king instead of president? No, this is not a commentary on U.S.’ current political situation but the premise of a popular YA book series that is being turned into a TV series.

In a very competitive situation, Netflix has landed for development American Royals, a drama inspired by Katharine McGee’s bestselling Alloy Entertainment young adult book series, which imagines an alternate history where George Washington was anointed king of the United States instead of being elected President and chronicles the lives of his young dependents. As customary for the YA adult genre, there is romance, with two princesses vying for the ultimate crown and two girls vying for the prince’s heart.

Fittingly, the adaptation will be written by Ted Malawer, who co-penned the movie adaptation of another popular YA book about contemporary young royals, Red, White & Royal Blue.

He is executive producing with Leslie Morgenstein (Purple Hearts, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants), Alloy Entertainment’s President and Chief Creative Officer. Warner Bros. Television, which owns Alloy, is the studio.

This marks a return to Netflix for Malawer who was a writer on the streamer’s limited series Halston starring Ewan McGregor.

Published by Ember, McGee’s American Royals series spans four books, American Royals (2019), Majesty (2020), Rivals (2022) and Reign (2023), as well as prequel novella Inheritance (2022).

Alloy, whose books have spawned such popular YA series as Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars and You, has the upcoming YA series The Probability of Miracles in production for Prime Video and the Netflix holiday movie “In a Holidaze” set for release later this year.

YA has become a hot genre in streaming, driven by the success of such series as Prime Video’s The Summer I Turned Pretty and Off Campus and Netflix’s Wednesday, Outer Banks and Ginny & Georgia and movies such as Netflix’s To All the Boys I Loved Before trilogy and Prime Video’s Red, White & Royal Blue, which has a sequel coming up.