Who can imagine someone else, other than Kristen Bell, playing Veronica Mars, the teen sleuth who outwits the baddies with brains and sarcasm?
In a dramatic reading with Entertainment Weekly, Bell revealed to audiences that the Rob Thomas-created treatment was originally a young adult novel.
As Bell quips with commentary along the way, she also drops a bombshell: The protagonist was originally a boy named Keith. (In the 2004 show, Veronica's private investigator father is named Keith.)
The actress read from “Untitled Teen Detective”:
“Keith is 17, yet he’s soaking up all the skills of a professional private eye. He wants to be able to help his father who hasn’t seemed the same since the old man quit a promising career with the Austin Police Department to open his own private investigation agency two years ago.”
Thomas also set the 1996 book proposal in Austin, Texas, not Neptune, like the pilot was set.
Even Bell interjected, “This sounds like a different show.”
In another potential uncharacteristic move, Thomas also revealed that Veronica was going to be a homecoming queen. Gasp!
The mystery drama, that eventually turned into a television series on the UPN before switching to The CW, ran from 2004 to 2007. After the show ended, a Kickstarter fund prompted the creator to give the show some closure for fans with a film in 2014.