Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for today:

TELEVISION

Actor Gilles Marini (Switched at Birth) will make a guest appearance on Devious Maids in July, playing opposite series lead Roselyn Sanchez, but details are being kept under wraps as to who he will be playing. (Kate Stanhope at TV Guide)

Actor John Barrowman (Torchwood) has been promoted to series regular status on Arrow when it returns this fall for its third season on The CW. (Twitter and Dark Horizons)

TV TRAILER

MINI-SERIES NEWS

Actress Elizabeth Perkins (Weeds) and actor Donald Sumpter (Game of Thrones) have joined the cast of the upcoming SundanceTV four-hour mini-series One Child that crosses the world as a Chinese-born young woman adopted by British parents must struggle with who she really is in order to decide where her loyalty lies. Perkins and Sumpter will play Katherine and Jim Arthurton, the adoptive parents of Mei, a first-born Chinese girl adopted by English parents who gets called back to Guangzhou when her birth mother desperately seeks her assistance in saving her son. (The Futon Critic)

ONLINE SERIES NEWS

Actress Joan Chen (Twin Peaks) has joined the cast of the Netflix series Marco Polo that will follow a young Marco Polo, who finds himself at the center of a brutal war between two empires in 13th century China, rife with close combat, romance and sexual intrigue, religious tension, political skullduggery and spectacular battles. Chen will play Chabi, empress of the Yuan Dynasty. The 10-episode series will debut on Netflix later this year. (Justin Kroll at Variety)

Actor T. R. Knight (Grey’s Anatomy) has landed the male lead in the Amazon Studios drama pilot Hysteria that will star Mena Suvari (Chicago Fire) as an exceptionally bright but socially awkward neurologist/psychiatrist who travels to her hometown of Austin, Texas, to investigate a mysterious epidemic that might be spreading among high school girls through technology. Knight will play Suvari’s brother, who tries convince his sister that the panic currently swallowing Austin is the same hysteria that sent him to prison 25 years ago, and if she will help to exonerate him, he’ll give her the clues she needs to resolve the crisis. (Vlada Gelman at TV Line)

BOX OFFICES NEWS

Actress Zoe Deutch (Vampire Academy and Beautiful Creatures – and who is also the daughter of actress Lea Thompson of Switched at Birth and Back to the Future fame) will star in the upcoming box office film called Cover Girl, about Meg, a Queens, NY girl who finds herself a fish out of water attending Cambridge Business School while financing her studies in an unusual way. (Jen Yamato at Deadline)

Halle Berry will star in the upcoming box office thriller Kidnap as the mother who will stop at nothing to rescue her abducted son. (Nancy Tartaglione at Deadline)

Actors Ed Westwick (Gossip Girl), Jeremy Sumpter (Peter Pan and Friday Night Lights and actress Phoebe Tonkin (The Originals) have joined the cast of the upcoming box office film Toy Soldiers that focuses on the sons and daughters of billionaires who have been sent by their frustrated parents to an exclusive, tough-love boot camp on a remote island. When they are taken hostage by a group of sophisticated kidnappers, the captives suddenly need every ounce of their brief training to survive. (Variety and Dark Horizons)

Actor Mike Colter (The Good Wife and Ringer) will star in the live-action digital feature film Halo that will follow a similar format to the “Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn” web series, following a 26th century surgically-enhanced super soldier. Colter is expected to play Marlowe, a rising star in a futuristic army who is troubled by aspects of the military industrial complex he inhabits. Approaching combat situations with caution and logic, he inspires loyalty in his fellow Spartans. (The Wrap and Dark Horizons)

That’s it. Enjoy!