Breaking Bad writer to adapt Anne of Green Gables in new project that could not be further from crystal meth

Safe to say Moira Walley-Beckett is going in a different direction for her next project

Megan Follows as Anne of Green Gables in the 1985 TV mini-series (Rex Features)

Breaking Bad’s writer has signed on to a new project that couldn’t be much further from the hit Netflix crime drama.

Moira Walley-Beckett has been chosen to adapt wholesome 1908 children’s novel Anne of Green Gables, about an orphaned girl sent to live on a farm, for an eight-part TV series.

Canadian broadcaster CBC has hinted that the show will “reflect timeless issues” and include themes of “identity, sexism, bullying, prejudice and trusting one’s self”. Presumably crystal meth will not feature.

Walley-Beckett has promised to “push the boundaries and give [the story] new life” after being attracted to Anne’s “tumultuous emotional journey” and the book’s “contemporary issues: feminism, prejudice, bullying and a desire to belong”.

Production is scheduled to begin this spring with an air date expected in 2017.

Since its publication, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables has sold over 50 million copies worldwide and been translated into 20 languages.

It has been adapted numerous times for film, TV movies and animated and live-action TV series.

Expectations will be high from fans after Walley-Beckett won an Emmy Award for her writing work on Breaking Bad season five episode “Ozymandias”.