Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for today:

TELEVISION

It’s official. Actor Chris Meloni (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit) is joining the cast of True Blood for Season 5. He will play an ancient, powerful vampire who holds the fate of Bill and Eric in his hands. (Michael Ausiello at TV Line)

Actor William Devane (Knots Landing) will appear as Edward Grayson, the father of Conrad Grayson (Henry Czerny) on Revenge. He will be summoned to Southampton to help in the divorce between Conrad and Victoria. The series will be back with new episodes on January 4. (Tanner Stransky at Entertainment Weekly)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Actor Chris Pratt (Everwood and Parks & Recreation) is in talks to play a lead role in the action drama formerly known as Kill Bin Laden from Oscar winning director Kathryn Bigelow. Actor Jason Clarke (Brotherhood and The Chicago Code) has the lead role thus far in the film. (Twitch and First Showing)

Actor Denzel Washington is rumored to be attached to the big screen adaptation of the popular 1980’s TV series The Equalizer. The original series followed Robert McCall, an agent with a mysterious past who once worked for a top-secret agency where he did some pretty horrible things; but he decided to right wrongs against the persecuted by settling scores with their antagonists and assorted miscreants. (Coming Soon, Variety and First Showing)

Actress Saoirse Ronan (Hanna and Atonement) will star in the independent drama How I Live Now, which is based on the 2004 novel by Meg Rosoff. The film follows a contemporary teenage New Yorker (Ronan) who spends the summer with family in the English countryside; but when a third world war breaks out and insurgents invade, she and a younger girl must survive alone in the woods as they try to make it to safety. (Variety and Dark Horizons)

Actress Rachel Boston (In Plain Sight) will star in the independent drama Marigolds alongside Noah Bean (Nikita and Damages). The film follows a young married couple who set off into the wilderness only to have the husband succumb mentally and emotionally. Paul Ben-Victor (In Plain Sight) co-stars. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Q&A SECTION (with Adam Bryant and Natalie Abrams at TV Guide and Michael Ausiello at TV Line)

Question: Can you give me some NCIS scoop to tide me over until January? — Annie

ADAM: New year, new bad guy. Look for the show to introduce a recurring villain described as a chameleonic one-man crime syndicate. He’s athletic, meticulous, extremely smart and deft at quickly changing his appearance.

Question: Got any scoop on Nikita? — Hector

NATALIE: When Nikita runs into her old rehab sponsor, she’ll finally learn the truth about the night that she killed a cop while hopped up on drugs. There were actually two cops on the scene, but someone from Division, her future employer, tidied up the witness list by, um, killing the other. [Insert ominous music here.]

Question: I can’t wait for Justified to come back. How will Raylan be affected by Winona’s pregnancy? — Gina

ADAM: Impending fatherhood and Raylan’s dangerous line of work aren’t exactly compatible. “It gives you pause [about] the decisions you’re making and how you’re living your life,” Timothy Olyphant tells us. “It just makes everything a little deeper, more important.” It sounds like this self-reflection will come in handy, given how much more treacherous this season will be. “We’re going to start taking people out this year,” Olyphant says. “We get right to some bullets flying. People get hurt.”

Question: Switched at Birth scoop, please! —Mena

Ausiello: When Switched at Birth‘s Katie Leclerc told us at the American Music Awards last month that “Wilke [is still] in the mix” for Daphne’s affections, she was downplaying things. We just screened the season 1.5 premiere (airing Jan. 3) and those two have quite the heart-to-heart on the pier.

Question: Chuck me! —Jeremy

Ausiello: Rebecca Romijn’s barbaric CIA agent — who debuts in this Friday’s episode — used to be a man! No, the actress isn’t playing another transgender character (as she did on Ugly Betty). Allow Chuck exec producer Chris Fedak to explain: “We created a character originally that was going to be a man. Kind of an ominous, scary figure with a penchant for torture, which he considers his art form. But then when we started thinking about it, I was like, “What if Rebecca Romijn was this guy? That would be scary and sexy… She was game for it, and she also has a great sense of humor.”

Question: Been following you for years – that alone makes me deserving of you fulfilling my every fantasy. Or at least some Hart of Dixie scoop. —Britta

Ausiello: Let’s stick with the scoop, Britta. Your other fantasies scare me. Wade/Zoe ‘shippers will be sad to hear that the two will soon butt heads again when Zoe discovers that he has started a betting pool based solely on her love life. Elsewhere, Lemon and George are moving full speed ahead with their wedding plans. We’ll see the two taste-testing cakes in an upcoming episode.

Question: Longtime reader, never written in before, but I need some Revenge hints to help me get through the break. Regarding the promo for the next episode, which shows Tyler pointing a gun — any hints as to who he fires at? Does it result in death? Does he even pull the trigger, or is it just one big tease? —Jack

Ausiello: I can’t answer all of your questions. Or, okay, technically, really any of them. But this might tide you over. Gabriel Mann, who plays Nolan, tells TV Line, tongue in cheek, “It probably wasn’t a good idea for [Tyler] to run out of those meds. That’s a little frightening for all of us.” And, perhaps especially, for his own character. “I will tease very, very bad things for him,” he says. “There is a reason you didn’t see him sitting at that table with everyone else.” Yikes! “Our coming back New Year episode,” he adds, “is… oh my God, I wish I could tell you more! I’m so tempted!” Alas, not tempted enough. If he blabbed, he says with a laugh, “I would get revenge’d right off the show!”

Question: I’m intrigued by the theory you guys put out there about Nolan and Emily being half-siblings on Revenge. Any reason to believe it’s actually true? —Michelle

Ausiello: No, but Gabriel Mann’s a fan of the idea. “I love that theory,” he told us. “That’s the thing with Emily and Nolan — and just us as actors — we have so much fun together that if they want to make us like a Luke and Leia situation, we’re so down… We’re like the tectonic twosome of the Hamptons. The two blonde avengers.”

That’s it. Enjoy!