“Scarpetta” Creator & Showrunner Liz Sarnoff on Crafting Her Razor‑Sharp, Nicole Kidman–Led Serial‑Killer Thriller

Few literary crime characters have endured quite like Dr. Kay Scarpetta. For more than three decades, readers around the world have followed the astute and nuanced chief medical examiner through the pages of Patricia Cornwell’s bestselling novels. These stories blend forensic science, psychological suspense, and deeply personal drama. Now, the iconic character is making her way to television in Prime Video’s Scarpetta, the new series based on Cornwell’s long-running book franchise.

At the helm of the newest adaptation, premiering on Prime Video on March 11th, is showrunner and executive producer Liz Sarnoff, whose previous credits include the acclaimed dark comedy Barry. The series also features executive producers and stars Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis, along with the involvement of the character’s creator, Patricia Cornwell.

For Sarnoff, adapting Scarpetta was a personal endeavor. The showrunner has been connected to Cornwell’s novels since their earliest days, making the opportunity to bring the series to the screen something of a full-circle moment. In conversation, Sarnoff discussed her long history with the books, the challenge of translating Scarpetta’s world to television, and why the series explores two different moments in the character’s life. The result, she says, is a story about confronting darkness while still finding ways to live and love beyond it.

Long before she became the showrunner of Scarpetta, Sarnoff was already a fan of Cornwell’s novels. “I really have a long history with these books,” she said. “I read them when they came out with my mom, and we loved Kay Scarpetta because she was the first female boss. We just loved that she also did all that morgue stuff while having a full life. She was cooking, gardening, and doing all of these other things.”

What struck Sarnoff most about the character was her sense of wholeness. Unlike many female characters in crime fiction at the time, Scarpetta didn’t exist solely within the confines of her profession. “She was a full character who didn’t really sacrifice any of herself for this amazing career that she was forming,” Sarnoff explained. “And I love these books. I thought she was amazing. I love [Pete] Marino [played by Bobby Cannavale in the series], and I love their voices. Patricia just told a great mystery.”

And when the opportunity to adapt the series arose, Sarnoff didn’t hesitate. “When I heard…I reached out and asked for the job,” she said. “You can’t create a show unless you really, really love it, because it’s a long, arduous process, and sometimes at the end you can have nothing.” That personal connection to the material helped sustain her throughout the lengthy development process. “At my tender age,” she added with a laugh, “you don’t want to jump into anything you don’t love a thousand percent. I was very committed from the beginning.”

Returning to the books as an adult also gave Sarnoff a fresh perspective on Cornwell’s storytelling. “It was fun to reread them again as an older person and see what it was that I loved,” she said, “and see all the ways we could do it and figure out how to get it across a season.” Adapting a beloved literary series presents unique challenges. With dozens of novels and a global fanbase, expectations for Scarpetta are understandably high. Sarnoff approached the adaptation by delving deeply into the source material and identifying the narrative threads that translated best to television. “I really just threw myself into the books,” she said. “I knew, on some level, that I wanted to do at least one book a season.”

Sarnoff realized, as she further explored the novels, that she wanted to tell a more layered story that would center on Kay Scarpetta’s life across two different periods. “I ended up splitting the timelines because I couldn’t part with the past and I couldn’t part with the present,” she said. “So I thought, well, let’s do both of them then.”

The series moves between two eras in Scarpetta’s career: her early years as a medical examiner and her later years as an established professional navigating new personal and professional challenges. “What’s more interesting than seeing a woman at 30 and a woman at 55 doing the exact same job in a completely different world?” Sarnoff said. “What’s the same, and what’s different? Do they do it better now, or did they do it better before?” To anchor these timelines, the show draws inspiration from two novels in particular: Cornwell’s debut Scarpetta book, “Postmortem,” and the much later installment, “Autopsy.”

“‘Postmortem’ is such a great first book,” Sarnoff said. “We had to start with it. And then the 25th book is ‘Autopsy,’ which picks them up later in their lives. It was interesting to read that book at that age and say, ‘Okay, I see this.’” The dual timelines also allowed Sarnoff to explore not only how Scarpetta’s career evolves but also how the world around her changes. “In the present day, Kay feels like now she could have it all,” she said. “She could be a wife, which she never was before, an aunt, a sister, live with her family, and still do this incredibly taxing job.”

One of the most delicate aspects of adapting Scarpetta was capturing the tone that has made Cornwell’s books so compelling: a blend of forensic detail, psychological suspense, and emotional drama.“We knew it had to be scary,” Sarnoff said. “And we knew it had to have procedural elements.” But she was equally determined to emphasize the characters’ emotional lives. “The part that I became more and more insistent upon was the character development and the family drama of it all,” she explained. “Because I felt like it needed all of those colors to be a full story.”

Sarnoff’s experience working on Barry also shaped how she approached the show’s tonal balance.“That show really pushed tone as far as it could go,” she said. “Our motto was, ‘How scary and dark can this be, and how stupid?’ That’s what we waffled between.”

While Scarpetta operates in a more grounded register, Sarnoff embraced a similarly wide emotional spectrum. “For this one, it was really like how much can we embrace this dark world and at the same time, have humor,” she said. “At the same time, have people who love each other, romantic stories, while basically the show is about loss at its core.” Yet even amid that darkness, Sarnoff believes the story ultimately celebrates resilience.“It’s also about living beyond loss,” she said. “And that became a really important part of it.”

Another key component of the series’ development was the collaborative relationship between Sarnoff and the show’s executive producers, including its two leading stars. “It was great to work with a bunch of chicks, to be honest,” Sarnoff said. “I’ve never been so supported by producers in my entire career.” She credits Kidman and Curtis with helping shape the show from its earliest stages. “Nicole and Jamie have stood by me through this process,” she said. “Jamie from day one, and Nicole as soon as she signed on. They supported the creative vision that we were trying to achieve.”

Both actors also brought a level of dedication that extended beyond their on-screen performances. “They’re both, beyond being great actors, workhorses,” Sarnoff said. “They want to rehearse.” In fact, some of the show’s earliest character work happened in the most informal of settings. “I was just talking to Nicole and saying, ‘Remember in the beginning we just sat on the floor and read scenes and talked about who the characters were?’” Sarnoff recalled. “It was just a joy.”

The collaborative spirit present between the creative team from the beginning proved essential as the series navigated the many creative decisions involved in bringing such a beloved story to life. “As you do a show, you sometimes make creative choices and you need the support of your producers,” she said. “You have a studio and a network and ten executive producers. They were always there for me. They never left me as far as the creative vision of the show.”

While the creative process may have flowed smoothly, the practical realities of production came with their own set of hurdles. The series was filmed primarily in Nashville, standing in for Virginia, where much of the story takes place. “One of our biggest hurdles was that we shot in Nashville, which is not Virginia,” Sarnoff said. “Though they’re getting more film-friendly because more shows are shooting there.”

Finding suitable locations proved particularly challenging. “When we got there to shoot, it was a challenge to find locations that looked like Virginia,” she explained. “And finding the house that they were all living in ended up being an hour away from our office.” That distance created logistical complications for the production schedule. “It created a time problem,” she said. “And then, of course, we didn’t know it snowed in Nashville,” Sarnoff said with a laugh. “It snowed multiple times. And every time it snowed, the whole town shut down.”

Despite these unexpected obstacles, Sarnoff said the production remained united by a shared creative purpose. “While there were logistical challenges, the creative of the show always felt very, not easy, but it felt like it guided itself to some degree,” she said. “Everybody was working toward the same goal.”

At its core, Scarpetta is about people who confront unimaginable darkness as part of their daily work. For Sarnoff, that theme is what ultimately makes the story resonate. “Most good storytelling is about people who’ve seen a lot of darkness and still have the ability to reach out,” she said. “To love their mate, their family, their people, and who are not destroyed by the darkness around them.”

That emotional resilience defines Scarpetta and the characters around her, including Benton Wesley [played by Hunter Parrish as a younger man and Simon Baker later] and Pete Marino [played by Jake and Bobby Cannavale, respectively]. “Every one of our characters has seen more darkness than anyone should see in a lifetime,” Sarnoff said. “And yet they’re still sitting down to eat pasta together like they’re normal.” For Sarnoff, those moments of connection are just as important as the show’s mysteries. “There’s a loveliness to these characters in that way,” she said. “When I’m looking for a show, I look for that high-stakes world that could be very scary and at the same time has deep emotional roots.”

With the first season of Scarpetta introducing audiences to the character’s world, Sarnoff hopes the show will continue exploring Cornwell’s extensive body of work. “We’re doing season two now. We’re about to start shooting,” she said. The creative team plans to continue the structure that defined the first season: drawing on two novels while maintaining the dual timelines that reveal different phases of Scarpetta’s life.

“The plan is the same, two books a season exploring both of these time periods,” Sarnoff explained. Given the sheer number of novels in the Scarpetta series, there is no shortage of source material.

“There is certainly a wealth of material out there,” she said. “If we can do it, I hope we keep doing it.” And with decades of stories still waiting to be explored, Sarnoff may have many seasons ahead of her.

If the new series captures even a fraction of the loyalty Cornwell’s books have inspired, Kay Scarpetta’s journey on screen may only just be beginning.

Scarpetta is streaming now on Prime Video.

Featured image: Kay Scarpetta (Nicole Kidman). Credit Connie Chornuk/Prime. Copyright: Amazon MGM Studios