Top of page

Student/Staff Portal
Global Site Navigation

Alumni and Supporters

Local Section Navigation
You are here: Main Content

Edith Cowan University (ECU) alum’s book set for screen adaption

Monday, 13 July 2026

Tags:

Related Contents

Holden Sheppard’s acclaimed adult novel Yeah the Boys will be bought to life on the small screen after an Australian production company secured its screen rights.

Yeah the Boys, set in contemporary Perth and Geraldton, tells the story of star full-forward Kade “Hammer” Hammersmith, whose tightly controlled life begins to collapse when he publicly attacks Pride Round whilst hiding the truth about his own sexuality.

The novel will be turned into a television drama by Deadset Pictures for Australian and international audiences.

Edith Cowan University (ECU) alum Holden, who completed a Bachelor of Arts Honours in 2012 and Diploma in Language Studies in 2014 at ECU, will serve as an executive producer on the screen adaptation

He said he was confident his book was in the right hands to be adapted authentically.

“I am so grateful that the characters of Zeke, Charlie and Hammer have received so much love from Australian audiences, and I hope they’ll be as excited as I am to see this chapter of their lives on screen,” he told Deadset.

Deadset Pictures co-founder Steve Pennells said Yeah the Boys had the scale, provocation and emotional force to connect well beyond the book’s existing audience.

“Holden has written the kind of book that demands to be seen,” he said.

“It’s funny, filthy, wounded, political and completely specific. Football is not a backdrop. Sex is not a backdrop. Shame is not a backdrop. They’re all part of how these men survive, lie, hurt each other and try to become honest.

“It’s Pride Round, locker rooms, country-town shame, Northbridge at night and the brutal Australian pressure on men to perform straightness even when it’s killing them.”

Likened to Australia’s equivalent of the Canadian sports romance global television hit, Heated Rivalry, Pennells said Yeah the Boys will be rawer, dirtier, a bit bogan and much more local.

Deadset Pictures co-founder Dan Bennett said he was thrilled to help bring Sheppard’s novel to screen.

“What Holden has achieved with this book is profound and life-changing for many,” he said.

“Deadset Pictures is deeply honoured to be involved, hand-in-hand, with Holden. LGBTQIA+ relationships are having a moment in mainstream culture in a way they never have before.

“This story is not only timely but also desperately, deeply important.

“The chance to bring this world to screen is enormous. It is intimate, confronting, funny, sexy and deeply Australian.”

Sheppard’s earlier novel Invisible Boys has also been adapted for television as a hit Stan Original Series.

Share

Skip to top of page