Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for today:

TELEVISION

Actor Richard Schiff (The West Wing) will have a multi-episode arc on NCIS, playing Harper Dearing, an eccentric international businessman who is no stranger to hobnobbing with the world’s elite. However, he is haunted by the loss of his son, who died in a terrorist bombing some years ago. (Adam Bryant at TV Guide)

Actress Emilie de Ravin (Lost) and Kristin Bauer van Straten (True Blood) will both be back in their roles of Belle and Maleficent (respectively) on Once Upon a Time next month. (Vlada Gelman at TV Line)

Actress Emmanuelle Chriqui (Entourage) will guest star in an upcoming episode of The Mentalist, playing Loraliei Martins, the love interest Patrick Jane (Simon Baker). She will appear in the May 17 finale and in the first five episodes of next season. (Lindsay Silberman at TV Guide)

Actor Richard Coyle (Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time and Coupling) will appear in Covert Affairs when it returns for season three this summer. He will play Simon, a Cambridge-educated and refined globe-trotting venture capitalist who just so happens to be a suspected KGB spy. Annie (Piper Perabo) is assigned to him, but soon finds herself more involved than she ever intended. He will recur throughout the season. (Joyce Eng at TV Guide)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Actor Landon Liboiron (from the short-lived Terra Nova) has joined the cast of the Netflix original series called Hemlock Grove, which is a 13-episode horror series set in a ravaged Pennsylvania steel town that begins with the discovery of a young girl’s body. As the crime goes unsolved and outlandish rumors mount, Roman (Bill Skarsgard) and Peter (as-yet uncast) decide to find the killer on their own, confronting unspeakable truths about themselves and Hemlock Grove as the mystery unfolds. Framke Janssen is set to play Olivia, the otherworldly beautiful and controlling grande dame of Hemlock Grove. Liborion will play Roman, Olivia’s son. (Lesley Goldberg at The Hollywood Reporter)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Actor Omar Epps (House) wrote and will star as well as produce the romantic comedy called Between Us, which is about two best friends looking for love in the wrong places with a contemporary twist. (Brian Brooks at Deadline)

Actor Dominic Cooper (The Devil’s Double and Captain America) is in negotiations to join Colin Farrell and Noomi Rapace in the revenge thriller called Dead Man Down. Farrell is to play a man who infiltrates a crime syndicate responsible for the death of his family while Rapace plays a mysterious, scarred beauty with intimate knowledge of his past. Whereas, Cooper is in talks to play a family man who works as Farrell’s partner on the street. (Variety and Dark Horizons)

Actress Abigail Breslin will star in the new supernatural mystery film called Haunter, playing a dead teenage girl’s spirit. She and her family died under sinister circumstances in 1986. Now, trapped in their house together and unable to move, she must help her present-day living counterpart to avoid the same fate she suffered. (Variety and Dark Horizons)

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

Question: What’s coming up for Stefan and Elena on The Vampire Diaries? I really miss them. — Sarah

NATALIE: Though Stefan and Elena haven’t been butting heads quite as much lately, don’t expect them to get swept up in another love affair. Still, they’ll make progress in a late April episode when Stefan escorts her to the 1920 Decade Dance. When he picks her up for the soiree, the pair will share a sweet exchange reminiscent of their early dating days.

Question: I was so psyched to see Daenerys and her dragons back on Game of Thrones! Any news on her? — Leela

NATALIE: Sadly, the khaleesi isn’t finding life any easier in the Red Waste. After last week’s desperate measures, she finds herself facing an even more discouraging setback when she discovers a loyal member of her khalasar has been killed.

Question: Anything — anything — you can tell me about Castle‘s zombie episode, titled “Undead Again”? —Cat

Ausiello: It airs April 30, one week before the season finale — and that was by design. “As part of this final Beckett/Castle run-up to a very emotional finale — where we confront a lot of the issues that the characters have been skirting all season — we felt like it was important to bring some fun into the show,” series creator Andrew W. Marlowe told TVLine’s Matt Mitovich. “Zombies are very much in the zeitgeist, and we thought it was something that was worth tackling.” The boss man hints that he found a “credible” way to incorporate Walkers into the procedural à la how “last season Castle was convinced that aliens were behind a murder.”

That’s it. Enjoy!