The Coen brothers set to write and direct a TV western

Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, natives of St. Louis Park, Minn., have a television miniseries in the works.
Stuart C. Wilson | Getty Images 2013

According to Variety, Joel and Ethan Coen have a new television project in the works. The Minnesota natives are set to write and direct a limited-series Western called "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs."

No details are available about when or on what platform the series could air.

Westerns are tried-and-true territory for the brothers, born and raised in St. Louis Park. They wrote and directed "No Country for Old Men" in 2007 and "True Grit" in 2010. Both of those projects were based on novels, by Cormac McCarthy and Charles Portis respectively. "The Ballad of Buster Scruggs" will be based on an original idea, according to Variety.

While the Coens are executive producers on the television adaptation of their classic film "Fargo," they are not involved in the production. In an interview with Radio Times last year, the brothers said they were "just not very interested" in the adaptation, which has won several Emmy awards.

Joel Coen told Radio Times that they preferred film to television because they "work short." A series is "just not how we think about stories," he said. "I mean, after two hours with a character we feel we're pretty much done with them."

Apparently they've had a change of heart for this new miniseries.

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