The atomic bomb research facility in Los Alamos, New Mexico, that devised the weapon that ended World War II was one of the nation’s best-kept secrets. Some outsiders, including geopolitical rivals, knew the Manhattan Project existed, but most of the American public remained completely unaware. The same, unfortunately, can be said of Manhattan, a 2014 TV series that won nearly universal hosannas from critics and was cherished by its viewers. If only there had been more of them.
Manhattan, sadly, was TV’s best-kept secret—a decade before Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer became a blockbuster by chronicling the atom bomb’s lead scientist. The show, set 70 years in the past, was just a few years ahead of its time, debuting right before the streaming era, when everything is available all the time and word of mouth can more easily power sleeper hits. Manhattan fell victim to the fact that it had to be sought out on an obscure network: remember WGN America…? Don’t worry, neither does anyone else.
Sam Shaw, now best known for the Stephen King–themed series Castle Rock, was Manhattan’s creator and showrunner, and his wife, Lila Byock (Watchmen, The Leftovers), was one of its writers. They have watched the cinematic debut of Nolan’s Oppenheimer with a sense of resignation, and even a little optimism. “If someone were to walk out of Oppenheimer and seek out Manhattan, I think that would be really a great outcome,” Byock says. “There’s obviously so many stories to be told about Los Alamos and about that moment in American history. There is room for many, many versions of it.”
The two seasons of Manhattan, spanning from the start of the research effort to the first nuclear test, known as Trinity, now streams for free on Tubi. Shaw had plans for at least four more seasons, with the actual dropping of the bombs on Japan in August 1945 happening at the midpoint, and the back half of the series focused on the new and even more dangerous conflict of the Cold War. “It still smarts that we didn’t get to tell the story in its fullness as we hoped,” Shaw says. “We actually had a lot of story that we were really excited to tell. The race against the Nazis, leading up to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was fascinating, but it kind of felt like the vegetables that we had to eat to get to the most morally complicated story. And sadly we didn’t get there.”
For the first time publicly, the creative team behind Manhattan reveal what might have been—and also, what almost was. They detail unwritten story arcs as well as alternate casting considerations for some of the key roles, among them the pivotal part of J. Robert Oppenheimer himself.
“When we were casting Oppenheimer, we went through a whole series of different ideas,” says Byock. “There were actually some rock stars we considered.”
She means that literally. “David Bowie was not available,” Shaw says. “I’m sure we talked about David Bowie, didn’t we?”
“We did talk about Beck,” Byock replies. “Do you remember if we reached out to Beck?”
“I don’t think we can say that we ‘reached out’ to Beck, but yes, it was something to think about,” Shaw says. “We wanted Oppenheimer to feel both like he possessed a certain undeniable charisma, a presence onstage, but also that he was playing a different instrument. He needed to feel alien—or other—in some ways. He stood out.”
Another casting possibility, they said, was Ebon Moss-Bachrach, who was then little known, but is now beloved as misfit cousin Richie on The Bear. “He’s got those eyes,” Byock says. But Manhattan’s Oppenheimer required aloofness and distance rather than the audience’s empathy.