Tiny Beautiful Things, based on the work of author Cheryl Strayed, starts on Hulu April 7. Kathryn Hahn portrays Clare, a struggling writer who becomes an advice columnist as her own life is falling apart.
Reese Witherspoon executive produces the show and Liz Tigelaar is creator and executive producer.
Clare’s marriage is limping along, her teen daughter is pushing her away, and her promising writing career has not come to fruition. An old writing pal asks her to take over as the advice columnist Dear Sugar, but she believes she’s not in a place to be giving anyone advice. She takes it on anyway.
“Through Sugar, Clare forms a salve for her readers -- and for herself -- to show us that we are not beyond rescue, that our stories can ultimately save us,” said Hulu. “And, perhaps, bring us back home.”
Sarah Pidgeon, Quentin Plair and Tanzyn Crawford are also in the cast.
At TCA press tour earlier this year, Strayed spoke of her friend Steve Almond asking her to take on the Dear Sugar column he was writing. “He said, ‘I'm writing the column, but you're Sugar. Will you take it over?’ He said, ‘The thing is, it doesn't pay anything. Nobody reads it, and it's anonymous, so you will get no credit for your work,’” she said. “Which pretty much described my writing career up until about then.”
Strayed’s books include Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. Witherspoon played Strayed in the movie Wild.
“And so, I said yes, and it became one of the most important things,” she said. “One of the most important yes’s of my life.”
Hahn said she was “a giant fan” of Wild but had not read Tiny Beautiful Things. “I had just read the pilot by Liz Tigelaar, which was so amazing, and I was so moved by the writing of Liz's,” she said, noting how she enjoys projects that take “into account the complexity that we all are as human beings and that finds compassion in that.”
Tigelaar spoke of the challenge of bringing Tiny Beautiful Things to screen. “Whenever you're adapting something, especially something that's already been adapted–this was a book, this was a podcast, this has been a play,” she said. “There certainly was an approach like, how are we going to make this its own thing, and why does it need to be adapted? And then, how do we do that by still honoring the core of what is so resonant about this? Because, you know, fans are fans. People want to see what they want to see.”
Lauren Neustadter, Laura Dern, Jayme Lemons, Cheryl Strayed, Stacey Silverman and Kathryn Hahn exec produce with Witherspoon and Tigelaar.
Witherspoon and Tigelaar previously worked on Little Fires Everywhere.
A review in Variety said of Hahn’s performance, “Her style may be familiar by now, but it also hasn’t worn thin. She has a knack for taking cerebral, internal conflicts, like honing a creative voice — another shared theme with “I Love Dick” and “Mrs. Fletcher” — and rooting them in the physical. Clare Pierce has as much of her as Cheryl Strayed, and “Tiny Beautiful Things” is all the better for it.”
