Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for today:

TELEVISION

Downton Abbey has been renewed for a 5th season. (Variety)

Actor Hiroyuki Sanada (the original Takeda on Revenge) will co-star opposite Halle Berry in the upcoming CBS summer drama Extant that will center on an astronaut (Berry) who returns home from a year-long solo mission in space and tries to reconnect with her husband and son in their everyday life. Her experiences in space and home lead to events that ultimately will change the course of human history. Sanada will play a wealthy technological genius who puts his wealth to work privatizing the world’s space programs into a single entity. (Nellie Andreeva at Deadline)

Actor Sinqua Walls (Teen Wolf and Once Upon a Time) and actress Katherine Narducci (The Sopranos) have joined the Starz drama series called Power, that tells the story of wealthy New York City nightclub owner James “Ghost” St. Patrick (Omari Hardwick), who caters to the city’s elite. He wants to build an empire and turn the club into a Fortune 500 business, but there’s just one problem: He is living a double life. When he is not in the club, he is the kingpin of the most lucrative drug network in New York for a very high-level clientele. Walls will play Shawn, once a promising college basketball player, who was injured and now works as Ghost’s personal chauffeur. Narducci will play Frankie, a sexy lesbian with a high-level government job, a U.S. Attorney, in charge of an ongoing investigation into the drug trade, and she is Angela’s (Lela Loren) boss. (Nellie Andreeva at Deadline)

M*A*S*H star Alan Alda will guest star in an upcoming episode of The Blacklist as an enemy of Red (series lead James Spader). He will play Mr. Crowley, a nemesis from Red’s past who threatens to kill Red if he gives certain information to Liz (series lead Megan Boone). (Liz Raftery at TV Guide)

Actress Elisabeth Rohm (The Client List and Law & Order) will appear in a four-episode arc of Beauty And the Beast as Dana Maron, an FBI agent who is dedicated to cleaning up the FBI, who arrives in town to spearhead a series of investigations into a string of undercover operations. She will team up with Catherine (series lead Kristin Kreuk) after being led to believe the detective has a special connection to the cases. (Sandra Gonzalez at Entertainment Weekly)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Here are the top 10 box office movies for this past weekend courtesy of Box Office Mojo:

1. Thor: The Dark World -$86.1 million
2. Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa – $11.3 million
3. Free Birds – $11.2 million
4. Last Vegas – $11.1 million
5. Ender’s Game – $10.25 million
6. Gravity – $8.4 million
7. 12 Years a Slave – $6.6 million
8. Captain Phillips – $5.8 million
9. About Time – $5.2 million
10. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs 2 – $2.8 million

Actor Dan Stevens (Downton Abbey and The Tomorrow People [he’s the voice of the AI machine Tim) will appear as Lancelot in the upcoming sequel Night At The Museum 3. (Mike Fleming, Jr. at Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!