Keanu Reeves exits the Hulu series The Devil in the White City

Hollywood superstar Keanu Reeves is no longer associated with The Devil in the White City, a Hulu series. The actor has left the project, which is produced by Leonardo DiCaprio and his frequent partner, director Martin Scorsese, reports entertainment news source Variety.

Based on Erik Larson's 2003 novel, the series would have been Keanu Reeves' first significant television appearance in the United States.

No explanation for Reeves' departure has been established. In the series, the Matrix Resurrections actor was supposed to play Daniel H Burnham, one of the two leads.

The true story of two men, an architect and a serial killer, is told in The Devil in the White City. Their fates were irrevocably connected by the Chicago World's Fair in 1893.

“It follows Daniel H Burnham, a brilliant and fastidious architect racing to make his mark on the world and Henry H. Holmes, a handsome and cunning doctor who fashioned his pharmaceutical Murder Castle on fair grouradhikands – a palace built to seduce, torture and mutilate young women. The story takes the viewer on a tour of murder, romance and mystery in the gilded age,” reads the official synopsis.

Since DiCaprio purchased the film rights to the book in 2010 and previously set it up as a feature at Paramount with Scorsese to direct, the high-budget project has been under production.

In 2019, Hulu announced that it was working on a series adaptation of the book. Reeves officially boarded the project in August this year.

Sam Shaw is adapting the book for the screen and will serve as showrunner and executive producer on the show, which is now a co-production between Paramount Television Studios and Disney's ABC Signature.

Rick Yorn, Stacey Sher and Mark Lafferty will executive produce alongside Scorsese, DiCaprio and his Appian Way partner, Jennifer Davisson.