Amazon Studios has boarded ITV’s forthcoming Succession–like drama Riches, with Them’s Deborah Ayorinde and Stephen’s Hugh Quarshie joining the cast as production kicks off in London.
The show from How To Get Away With Murder writer Abby Ajayi will premiere on Amazon Prime in the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Nordics and Sub-Saharan Africa. Amazon and ITV previously tied on Kate Beckinsale drama The Widow.
Joining Ayorinde and Quarshie are Ted Lasso’s Sarah Niles, Downton Abbey’s Brendan Coyle and Luther’s Hermione Norris, along with Adeyinka Akinrinade (Top Boy, Temple), Ola Orebiyi (Cherry, A Brixton Tale), C.J. Beckford (Sitting in Limbo, The Trial of Christine Keeler) Nneka Okoye (Grantchester, The A List) and Emmanuel Imani (Cobra, Black Earth Rising).
Revealed exclusively by Deadline a year ago, Riches, which spans New York and London, comes from Been So Long producer Greenacre Films in association with ITV Studios’ Monumental Films and starts with self-made millionaire Stephen Richards (Quarshie) suffering a stroke.
His family’s secrets and lies rise to the surface and the future of his multi-million pound cosmetics business is placed in peril as the children from his two marriages’ lives begin to collide. The show has shades of Sky/HBO’s smash-hit Succession, which also begins with entrepreneurial patriarch Logan Roy (Bryan Cox) suffering a stroke.
Ajayi called the drama a “love letter to Black London,” adding that it has been “thrilling to create the Richards family and celebrate their opulence, ambition and immigrant grit.”
Exec producers are Nadine Marsh-Edwards, Amanda Jenks, Alison Owen and Alison Carpenter. Ajayi is also directing alongside Darcia Martin and Sebastian Thiel. Banijay Rights is distributor.