Peacock has given a straight-to-series order to 1970s espionage thriller "Ponies", starring and executive produced by Emilia Clarke ("Game of Thrones"). The project, co-created, co-written and executive produced by Susanna Fogel ("The Flight Attendant") and David Iserson ("Mr. Robot") and exec produced by Jessica Rhoades ("Black Mirror"), previously had a cast-contingent blinking green light, which Clarke’s casting turned into a firm order.
Fogel is set to direct, while Iserson will serve as showrunner. The two executive produce "PONIES" with Rhoades via her Pacesetter Productions, with the company’s EVP Alison Mo Massey serving as co-executive producer alongside Katherine Bridle. The series is produced by Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group.
Set in Moscow in 1977, the series follows two “PONIES” (“persons of no interest” in intelligence speak) who work anonymously as secretaries in the American Embassy. That is until their husbands are killed under mysterious circumstances in the USSR, and the pair become CIA operatives. Bea (Clarke) is an over-educated, Russian-speaking child of Soviet immigrants. Her cohort, Twila, is a small-town girl who is as abrasive as she is fearless. Together, they work to uncover a vast Cold War conspiracy and solve the mystery that made them widows in the first place.
Clarke is currently filming another streaming series, "Criminal", for Amazon’s Prime Video. She stars opposite Charlie Hunnam, Richard Jenkins, John Hawkes and Adria Arjona (among others) in that drama, based on the graphic novel by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips.