Paul Giamatti was set to headline a Hostel series for Peacock. Eli Roth says the streamer has passed on it. “Peacock said no, they’re not going to do it,” he told interviewer Edward Douglas in a conversation that went up on YouTube in August and only began circulating this week.
The scripts exist, and Roth is not giving them up. “But Chris Briggs and I wrote the scripts and we love them and I definitely want to turn them into something,” he said. “So it might not be a TV series, but I still want to continue Hostel.”
The Series Giamatti Signed On For
The Hollywood Reporter broke the project in 2024, with Giamatti closing a deal to star and Roth set to write and direct alongside Hostel collaborators Chris Briggs and Mike Fleiss. Fifth Season, the studio behind Severance, was producing, and the show was billed as a modern reinvention of the original premise: wealthy clients paying for the privilege of killing backpackers. It landed at Peacock in July 2025, with Roth writing, directing and executive producing. Giamatti’s role was never announced.
The Last ‘Hostel’ Movie Came Out in 2011
Roth wrote and directed Hostel in 2005 and Hostel: Part II in 2007. Hostel: Part III arrived in 2011 from director Scott Spiegel, moved the auction to Las Vegas, and went straight to home video. It is the only entry Roth had no hand in writing or directing, and nothing has carried the name in the fifteen years since.
Roth recorded those remarks in August. NBCUniversal has since reported that the Friday the 13th prequel Crystal Lake became Peacock’s fourth-biggest scripted original debut.
Roth has not said where the scripts go next. His last release, Ice Cream Man, reached theaters through his own company, The Horror Section.