Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWAL

Netflix has renewed the fantasy drama Fate: The Winx Saga for a 2nd season. (Variety)

CANCELLATION

Seemingly due to low ratings, NCIS: New Orleans will come to an end at the conclusion of its current 7th season, ending for good on May 16, which will mark the show’s 155th episode. (TV Line and Deadline)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

A new NCIS spinoff set in Hawaii is in development at CBS. Few plot details are available other than it will follow a team of Naval criminal investigators who operate on the Hawaiian islands. (Variety)

Actor Billy Campbell (Once and Again and The 4400) has landed the lead role in the ABC drama pilot National Parks, which includes Kevin Costner among its writers and executive producers. The show will take a darker, more sinister look at the parks that attract a vast array of criminal activity, following the small group of elite NPS agents as they solve these crimes while protecting these national treasures. Campbell will star as Cal Foster, an experienced ISB special agent who has worked in the field for years, but is now stepping into a new leadership role. He wonders how the team he’s worked alongside will respond to taking orders from him, but Cal is determined to honor the position and help his fellow agents no matter what. (Variety)

CBS is also plotting another spin-off to the FBI franchise. FBI: International would deal with the agents that make up the international branch of the FBI. (Variety)

HBO Max has given a series order to Subject to Change, a new drama from J.J. Abrams, which will follow a desperate college student who signs up for a clinical trial that is the starting point for a reality-bending adventure. (Variety)

Paramount+ (formerly CBS All Access) is looking at a possible Criminal Minds reboot as a limited event series. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Actress Simone Ashley (Sex Education and the UK original Broadchurch) will play Kate Sharma (nee Sheffield), a love interest for the highly eligible Anthony Bridgerton (series regular Jonathan Bailey) in the upcoming season two of Bridgerton. Kate is a smart, headstrong London newcomer “who suffers no fools; Anthony very much included.” Kate is among a number of new characters expected for the 2nd season, which will be based on the second novel in the franchise of books by Julia Quinn entitled “The Viscount Who Loved Me.” (Deadline and TV Line)

New cast members for the upcoming Black Lightning spin-off series Painkiller [Jordan Calloway will play the titular character] have been announced. They include Sibongile Mlambo (Teen Wolf, Siren and Lovecraft Country), Alexander Hodge (Insecure, Tommy and Modern Family) and James Roch (The Night Shift). Mlambo will play Maya, a strikingly attractive woman who is icy and mysterious; Hodge will play Philky, a once homeless alcoholic from Gotham who now works as an inconspicuous bartender and is an exceptionally gifted tech wiz; and Roch will play Cousin Donald, a larger-than-life, gentle giant who was a medic in the Marines. (Deadline)

Actress Archie Panjabi (The Good Wife) has joined the 3rd season of Snowpiercer. She will play a character named Asha, but details are being kept under wraps. (Deadline)

Actor Aaron Eckhart will star opposite Viola Davis and Michelle Pfeiffer in the Showtime anthology series The First Lady, a revelatory reframing of American leadership, told through the lens of the women at the heart of the White House. Season 1 will focus on Eleanor Roosevelt, Betty Ford (Pfeiffer) and Michelle Obama (Davis). Eckhart will play President Gerald R. Ford Jr. Also, Judy Greer will take on the role of Nancy Howe, Ford’s trusted confidante and social secretary. Greer takes over the role from Pamela Adlon, who had to drop out of the project due to a scheduling conflict. (Deadline and Variety)

Actress Minnie Driver has joined the cast of the Amazon series Modern Love for the drama’s second season, but details about the character for which she will play is being kept under wraps. The series depicts an exploration of love in all of its complicated and beautiful forms, with each standalone episode based on some of the most popular stories from the New York Times column on which it is based. (Variety)

Actress Aunjanue Ellis and Andrene Ward-Hammond have been added to the cast of the upcoming AMC drama 61st Street, which has been ordered as a two-season television event with eight episodes per season. The series is a courtroom drama that follows Moses Johnson (Tosin Cole), a promising, black high school athlete, who is swept up into the infamously corrupt Chicago criminal justice system. Taken by the police as a supposed gang member, he finds himself in the eye of the storm as police and prosecutors seek revenge for the death of an officer during a drug bust gone wrong. Ellis will play Martha Roberts, a candidate for alderman on the South Side who is very skilled at telling the voting public that her drive and ambition will be placed at their service. The wife of Franklin Roberts (Courtney B. Vance) and a former stay-at-home mom to their autistic son, David, Martha is torn between her burgeoning career in politics and the needs of her family. Ward-Hammond will play Norma Johnson, a cleaning lady at the local courthouse and a dedicated mother to her two sons, Moses and Joshua (Bentley Green). (Variety)

Netflix has ordered a live action series centered around Wednesday Addams (from The Addams Family). Wednesday will be a young adult TV series about a sleuthing, supernaturally infused mystery charting Wednesday Addams’ years as a student at Nevermore Academy. She attempts to master her emerging psychic ability, thwart a monstrous killing spree that has terrorized the local town, and solve the supernatural mystery that embroiled her parents 25 years ago — all while navigating her new and very tangled relationships at Nevermore. Smallville executive producers Al Gough and Miles Millar created the series and will serve as showrunners and executive producers while Tim Burton is set to direct and executive produce. (Variety)

A series based on the Sally Rooney book “Conversations With Friends” will move forward via Hulu-BBC Three and has announced cast members, which include Alison Oliver, Sasha Lane, Joe Alwyn and Jemima Kirke in four of the lead roles. The series follows Frances (Oliver), a 21 year old college student, as she navigates a series of relationships that force her to confront her own vulnerabilities for the first time. Her ex-girlfriend, now best friend, Bobbi (Lane) is self-assured, outspoken and compelling. Though they broke up three years ago, Frances and Bobbi are virtually inseparable and perform spoken word poetry together in Dublin. It’s at one of their shows that they meet Melissa (Kirke), an older writer, who is fascinated by the pair. Bobbi and Frances start to spend time with Melissa and her husband, Nick (Alwyn), a handsome but reserved actor. While Melissa and Bobbi flirt with each other openly, Nick and Frances embark on an intense secret affair that is surprising to them both. Soon the affair begins to test the bond between Frances and Bobbi, forcing Frances to reconsider her sense of self, and the friendship she holds so dear. The series is scheduled to premiere in 2022 on Hulu in the US and premiere on BBC Three and air on BBC One in the UK. (Variety)

Actor John Wesley Shipp will, once again, reprise his role of The Flash (aka Jay Garrick) in The CW superhero series Stargirl. He will appear in a pivotal flashback episode that establishes the Golden Age Flash as a member of Earth-2’s Justice Society of America, bringing Stargirl (series lead Brec Bassinger) into The CW’s post-Crisis universe alongside existing shows The Flash, Superman & Lois, Batwoman, Black Lightning, Supergirl and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow. (Entertainment Weekly)

Kristin Bell (Veronica Mars herself) and Tom Riley (Da Vinci’s Demons and the upcoming series The Nevers) will appear together in the Netflix limited series The Woman in the House. The tagline for the series is: For heartbroken Anna (Bell), every day is the same. She sits with her wine, staring out the window, watching life go by without her. But when a handsome neighbor moves in across the street, Anna starts to see a light at the end of the tunnel. That is until she witnesses a gruesome murder… Or did she? You guessed it Riley will play the new neighbor, a charming and handsome single dad. But is this undeniably sexy widower too good to be true? (Deadline and The Futon Critic)

Actor Josh Lucas (Sweet Home Alabama and Ford v Ferrari) will star opposite Rose Rollins (The L Word and Condor) in the upcoming drama Long Slow Exhale from Spectrum Originals that follows J.C. Abernathy (Rollins), the successful head coach of a competitive women’s college basketball team who finds herself in the middle of a potentially career shattering sexual abuse scandal. Sorting through the secrets to unravel the truth, she is forced to make decisions that will affect her, her family and the young female athletes who depend on her. Lucas will play Hilman Ford, athletic director of the university. (Deadline)

MacGyver will welcome Ernie Hudson and Wendy Raquel Robinson as Milton and Lauretta Bozer, the parents of Wilt (series regular Justin Hires). They will guest star in an episode set to air in the Spring. (TV Line)

MOVIE CASTING NEWS

Bridgerton hunk Regé-Jean Page (the Duke of Hastings) has joined the cast of the upcoming movie adaptation of Dungeons & Dragons (the role playing game that has been around for over 45 years), playing a lead role in the movie. He joins previously announced cast members Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez and Justice Smith. (Deadline)

Award winner Regina King is set to star in and produce the box office film entitled Shirley where she will play legendary Shirley Chisholm, America’s first Black congresswoman. (Variety)

Soap actress Sasha Calle (The Young and the Restless) has landed the role of Supegirl in the upcoming movie installment of The Flash. Calle will be the first Latina ever to portray the superhero. (Variety)

Charlize Theron and Kerry Washington will star in the Netflix movie The School for Good and Evil that is based on the young adult fantasy novel by Soman Chainani, which follows best friends Sophie and Agatha as they are kidnapped to the School for Good and Evil. After their fortunes are reversed, their friendship is put to the test as the duo attempts to return home. Washington will play Professor Dovey while Theron will play Lady Lesso. (Variety)

Rachel McAdams and youngster Abby Ryder Fortson (she played little Cassie in the Ant-Man films) have been cast in the movie adaptation of the Judy Blume coming-of-age book Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. Fortson will play Margaret Simon, a sixth-grade girl who is going through puberty and searches the universe for any answers she can find while McAdams will play Margaret’s mother, Barbara. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!