Filmmaker Steve McQueen, who recently scored critical and box office success with the Academy Award-winning 12 Years a Slave, is getting ready to write and direct a big screen adaptation of the British crime TV series Widows.

Oscar-winning filmmakers Iain Canning and Emile Sherman (The King’s Speech) will produce the film alongside McQueen. The 1980’s TV series that serves as the basis for the movie followed the exploits of three women whose husbands were killed during an armed robbery. With the help of several books detailing their late husbands’ past heists, the women organize their own raid.

McQueen, a big fan of the TV show, is reportedly very enthusiastic about the project. One of the things said to interest McQueen the most is the storyline’s theme of female empowerment, which was still a relatively new concept when the series originally premiered in the director’s native England.

This big screen adaptation will be set in the U.S. during present day. No cast members have been named yet, but considering how anxious actors are to work with McQueen, the starring roles are expected to be highly coveted.

Prolific television writer Lynda La Plante (Prime Suspect) penned the series. It isn’t clear whether she will be directly involved in the film adaptation. In the years since the original series, she has revisited the material, writing a Widows miniseries for American TV in 2002, which starred Brooke Shields and Rosie Perez.