Adam Baldwin

THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (NBC, New!) - The Peacock has snatched up the rights to the four-hour Hallmark Entertainment-produced mini-series, which stars Steve Guttenberg, Peter Weller, Rutger Hauer, Bryan Brown and Adam Baldwin. The project was originally targeted for the Hallmark Channel itself, however NBC - hoping to find another tentpole mini-series event - snagged the Robert Halmi-produced adaptation for roughly $20 million. "Adventure" then will air at some point during the 2005-06 season, well before the big-budget Wolfgang Petersen-directed feature (set to hit theatres in May 2006). Here’s how Hallmark’s press materials describe the project: "The blockbuster phenomenon now becomes a precedent-setting new miniseries as Hallmark Entertainment raises the stakes-and the fear factor-in a hair-raising adaptation of Paul Gallico’s bestselling passage into unfathomable suspense. Welcome aboard the majestic S.S. Poseidon-a virtual floating city-as it departs from Athens on a month-long cruise. Among the 2,500 hundred passengers is Mike Rogo (Adam Baldwin, Full Metal Jacket), undercover agent for Homeland Security. Among the crew of 1,200 is Kasim Badawi, a terrorist conspiring to send an explosive message to the world. Acting on word of the impending danger, the Poseidon pushes its engine at full speed toward the nearest port, slicing through the churning waters of an escalating storm and directly into unavoidable catastrophe. Only minutes into the new year, the bomb detonates, leaving the shredded hull vulnerable to the roiling seas pouring into the wounded Poseidon. The 136,000-ton beast capsizes, leaving a chosen few underwater and terrified for their lives."

"It’s hell upside down as the disparate survivors make their way up...to the bottom of the S.S. Poseidon: Richard Clarke (Steve Guttenberg, Three Men and a Baby), a husband and father torn between a mistress he must save and the family he can’t live without; European pop star Aimee Anderson (Tinarie Van Wyk, Backstage), embarking on an American career and a new Hollywood marriage; Belle Rosen (Sylvia Syms, What a Girl Wants), a widow enduring in the name of her beloved late husband; and Rogo and his reviled prisoner Badawi, handcuffed together in a personal war of justice, sacrifice, and revenge. Through the twisted metal inferno of the inverted ship, they must outlast the inevitable as the Poseidon sinks deeper and deeper into darkness. From this nightmarish maze emerges a drama of human spirit and resilience, of life-and-death emotions and psychological terrors, and of the unyielding strength of the human will to survive against all odds. With an all-star cast that also includes Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Bryan Brown (The Thorn Birds), Golden Globe winner Rutger Hauer (Salem’s Lot), C. Thomas Howell (Gods and Generals), and Oscar nominee Peter Weller (Robocop), The Poseidon Adventure is an ingenious mix of breathtaking special effects, heart-pounding human drama, and alarming suspense surpassing all that has come before for sheer epic adventure-level by terrifying level."