Jeffrey Dean Morgan Teases Start of Production on The Walking Dead Spinoff

The Walking Dead is making a brand new start of it in old New York. Months after filming wrapped on the flagship series’ finale in Georgia, spinoff Isle of the Dead is starting production this month in Manhattan and New Jersey. The fifth series set in AMC’s TWD Universe and the first to shoot in the Empire State, the spinoff follows Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) and Maggie Rhee (Lauren Cohan) as they travel together into post-apocalyptic New York City. Showrunner Eli Jorné, a writer and co-executive producer on The Walking Dead, created the series and will serve as executive producer alongside Morgan and Cohan for AMC Studios.

On Sunday, Morgan teased the start of production on the Walking Dead spinoff with a photo of the Isle of the Dead pilot script written by Jorné. “Here we go,” the Negan actor captioned the image posted on Instagram. 

Loren Yaconelli, who helmed a Season 11 episode of Walking Dead and several episodes of The Walking Dead: World Beyond, is directing the pilot. AMC Networks describes the six-episode first season: “Isle of the Dead envisions the popular Maggie and Negan characters traveling into a post-apocalyptic Manhattan long ago cut off from the mainland. The crumbling city is filled with the dead and denizens who have made New York City their own world full of anarchy, danger, beauty, and terror.” 

During a March appearance on The Rich Eisen Show, Morgan confirmed Isle of the Dead would shoot not far from his family’s Mischief Farm ranch in upstate New York. 

“We’re gonna shoot in Manhattan, so I get to be home,” Morgan said. “I think seeing zombies in Manhattan is gonna be super fantastic.” 

Isle of the Dead “not only adds another compelling series to this collection, it extends our storytelling around two unforgettable characters fans have grown to love, hate or hate and then love in Maggie and Negan, brilliantly inhabited by Lauren and Jeffrey,” Dan McDermott, president of entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks, said when announcing the spinoff series in March. “It also lets us explore a corner of this universe located on the island of Manhattan, with an iconic skyline that takes on a very different meaning when viewed through the lens of a zombie apocalypse.”

Isle of the Dead is set to premiere in 2023 on AMC and AMC+. 

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