Liev Schreiber to Play Anne Frank's Father in Disney+ Series A Small Light
Paul Dailly
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Liev Schreiber has lined up his next TV role, and it will be deeply rooted in history.
Disney+ announced this week that Bel Powley (The Morning Show), Schreiber (Ray Donovan), and Joe Cole (Peaky Blinders) will star in the fact-based, scripted series from National Geographic A Small Light.
The series will focus on the real-life story of Miep Gies, who played a critical role in hiding Anne Frank and her family.
Executive producers and writers Joan Rater and Tony Phelan (ABC's Grey's Anatomy, Council of Dads) will serve as showrunners and executive producer Susanna Fogel (The Flight Attendant, Cat Person) will direct multiple episodes, including the pilot.
Shooting will commence this summer 2022 in Prague and Amsterdam. T
"The powerful, eight-episode limited series tells the remarkable story of 20-something secretary Miep Gies (Bel Powley), who didn't hesitate when her boss Otto Frank (Liev Schreiber) asked her to hide him and his family from the Nazis during World War II," according to the logline.
"For the next two years, Miep, her husband Jan (Joe Cole) and several other everyday heroes watched over the eight souls hiding in the secret annex."
"It was Miep who found Anne's diary and preserved it so that she and Otto could later share it with the world."
The series title comes from something Gies said late in her life: "I don't like being called a hero because no one should ever think you have to be special to help others."
"Even an ordinary secretary or a housewife or a teenager can turn on a small light in a dark room."
Schreiber is on board to play "Otto Frank, Anne Frank's father, who escaped Germany in the '30s when the Nazis' rise to power made life dangerous for Jews," according to Disney+.
Otto remained the most optimistic member of those in hiding: he was the rock, the father figure, the boss.
After the war, he maintained that optimism when he returned from Auschwitz and waited for his daughters to return.
When he learned they had both died, it was Miep who gave him Anne's diary that she had saved from the hands of the Nazis.
Schreiber is coming off Ray Donovan, which lasted seven seasons before being canceled at Showtime.
The cabler then ordered a movie to wrap up the series for good.
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Paul Dailly was an Associate Editor for TV Fanatic.Follow him on X.
