SHOWTIME(R) LAUNCHES "PENNY DREADFUL" PRODUCTION BLOG, DIGITAL COMPANION GIVES VIEWERS AN INSIDE LOOK AT THE MAKING OF THE SERIES

Network Partners With Goodreads For Series-Inspired Digital Book Club

New York, NY (December 20, 2013) - In preparation for the premiere of the highly-anticipated new original series PENNY DREADFUL, SHOWTIME has launched The Penny Dreadful Production Blog, a first of its kind for any SHOWTIME series. Penny-Dreadful.com provides an in-depth look into the creation of the series, and offers unprecedented access from the series' creative team and producers. Fans will be taken behind the scenes to the production of the series from its early stages, as it is currently shooting in Ireland, through the end of season one.

Today, the network released a new video blog (http://s.sho.com/1fMoS5B) featuring series creator, writer and executive producer, three-time Oscar(R) nominee John Logan as he walks viewers through the literary works that inspired this next great SHOWTIME drama. Over the course of filming, the Production Blog will feature interviews with the show's cast, producers, crew and various scholars, giving fans a greater understanding of the show's origins, inspiration and themes.

SHOWTIME has partnered with the popular website Goodreads to create a digital book club where viewers can re-read and discuss the classic literary inspirations for PENNY DREADFUL online, including Frankenstein, Dracula, and The Picture of Dorian Gray. Series creator John Logan will provide discussion points and commentary on the site (http://bit.ly/1beOeUJ) to further engage the series' new fans.

In PENNY DREADFUL, some of literature's most famously terrifying characters - including Dr. Frankenstein, Dorian Gray and iconic figures from the novel Dracula, all brilliantly reimagined in a whole new light - have become embroiled in Victorian London. The series stars Josh Hartnett (Black Hawk Down), Eva Green (Casino Royale) Timothy Dalton (The Living Daylights, License to Kill), Reeve Carney (Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark), Rory Kinnear (Skyfall), Harry Treadaway (The Lone Ranger), Billie Piper (Doctor Who, Secret Diary of a Call Girl) and Danny Sapani (The Bill). PENNY DREADFUL is a frightening psychosexual thriller created, written and executive produced by John Logan (Hugo, The Aviator, Gladiator) and executive produced by Logan's Desert Wolf Productions, along with Oscar winner Sam Mendes (American Beauty, Skyfall) and Pippa Harris (Revolutionary Road, Call The Midwife), both of Neal Street. Of the eight episodes, the first two will be directed by Juan Antonio Bayona, who helmed The Orphanage and the acclaimed film, The Impossible starring Naomi Watts in her Oscar-nominated performance.