Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWAL/CANCELLATIONS

OWN has renewed Queen Sugar for its 7th and final season. (Variety)

Netflix has cancelled YA skating drama Zero Chill after one series. (Deadline)

The Sinner will come to a conclusion at the end of its current fourth season, meaning the December 1 episode on the USA Network will be its series finale. (Variety)

STREAMING CASTING NEWS

More cast members have been added to the upcoming Netflix, live-action series Avatar: The Last Airbender. Paul Sun-Hyung Lee (Kim’s Convenience and The Mandalorian) will play Uncle Iroh, a retired Fire Nation general and the wise and nurturing mentor to his hot-headed nephew, Prince Zuko. Lim Kay Siu (Anna and The King and Nightwatch) will play Gyatso, a kind and caring Air Nomad monk who is the guardian, father figure and best friend to Aang; and Ken Leung (Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Lost ) will play Commander Zhao, a scheming and ambitious Fire Nation military officer who’s eager to leverage an unexpected encounter with a desperate Prince Zuko to advance his personal goals. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Newcomer Senan West, the 13-year-old, real-life son of actor Dominic West – who will be playing Prince Charles in the upcoming 5th season of The Crown – will portray Prince William in the streaming series. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Derek Luke will be reuniting with Katie Holmes (nearly 2 decades after they starred in 2003’s Pieces of April) in the upcoming movie Rare Objects which Holmes will not only star in, but also produce and direct. The movie, based on the Kathleen Tessaro novel, tells the story of a young woman with a traumatic past who seeks to rebuild her life when she begins working at an antique store. Luke will play antiques dealer Winshaw. (Variety)

Sterling K. Brown (This Is Us) will star in the box office movie The Defender as pioneering lawyer Scipio Africanus Jones, who risked his life and career to defend the Elaine Twelve: a group of 12 Black sharecroppers sentenced to death for allegedly being involved in the murder of a white man during the Elaine Massacre of 1919 in Arkansas. (Variety)

Jurnee Smollett (Lovecraft Country and Birds of Prey) has landed the female lead in the new courtroom drama The Burial from Amazon Studios. She will star opposite Jamie Foxx and Tommy Lee Jones in thefilm that is based on a true story. The film follows a bankrupt funeral home owner who decides to sue a rival businessman over a handshake deal gone wrong. The owner hires a flamboyant attorney (Foxx) to handle the case. Smollett will play Foxx’s opposing counsel. (Variety)

The one and only Delroy Lindo has joined the cast of the Marvel Studios movie Blade that will star Moonlight actor Mahershala Ali as the titular human-vampire hybrid. It is unclear who Lindo will be playing, but one strong possibility is Jamal Afari, who in the Marvel comics is the man who raised and mentored Blade (aka Eric Brooks) in the ways of vampire hunting when Eric was young. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!