The Skull And Bones—a society so secret that no less than six books about it are available to be delivered right to your front door, along with a movie starring Joshua Jackson—has counted among its members men who went on to become presidents, Supreme Court justices, and Paul Giamatti. Producers have tried to create TV dramas exploring the group’s secret operations before (which again, really aren’t that secret), with ABC ordering a series about a former member tasked with investigating the society just last year. Now Rob Reiner will try again, executive producing a thriller about the group for the USA Network—assuming a mysterious series of anonymous phone calls doesn’t convince him to back out beforehand.
The show will be set at Yale during the late ’60s, right around the time Secretary of State John Kerry and the second President Bush were members of Skull and Bones (an opportunity for a pair of actors to become television’s next great odd couple). Similar to ABC’s concept, it will revolve around an ambitious Yale student who’s recruited by the CIA to infiltrate the society. Considering that one of the many conspiracy theories surrounding the Skull and Bones is that it secretly controls the CIA, expect the hero to ask plenty of tough questions—about how far up this thing really goes, just who is involved, and, dear God, what have they gotten themselves into—after it premieres.