Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

GENERAL NEWS

The Writers Guild of America has gone on strike against the studios, and that has started the gradual halt of production. Be prepared for a delay on all programming because of this.

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

CBS has pulled the plug on the drama S.W.A.T., meaning the May 19 finale will be the show’s series end. (TV Line)

For whatever reason, FOX has not renewed the long-running drama 9-1-1, but the show isn’t ending. Rather the first responder series has been picked up by ABC. (TV Line)

Netflix has given a third and final season order for the comic adaptation of Sweet Tooth. (TV Line)

The new Keri Russell-led political drama The Diplomat has been given a second season renewal by Netflix. (TV Line)

Amazon Freevee has given a third season renewal to Bosch: Legacy ahead of its second season premiere. (TV Line)

FOX has given a 5th season renewal to 9-1-1: Lone Star. (TV Line)

As has been rumored for several weeks now, the official announcement has been made that Yellowstone will end on the Paramount Network at the end of its current 5th season, which will return for its final episodes in November. Also, the as-yet-untitled spin-off will debut in December, but there is no confirmation of the rumor that Matthew McConaughey will be the star or not. (TV Line)

TV SERIES NEWS

Netflix is readying its next installment of its Monsters anthology series from Ryan Murphy. Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story will be the new focus, telling the story of how the brothers captured national attention while on trial in 1993 for the 1989 murder of their affluent parents, which they claimed was self-defense. After receiving a hung jury, the brothers were tried a second time in 1995. They were subsequently found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without parole. (TV Line)

Netflix has given a greenlight to The Corps, a 10-episode, 1990-set dramedy starring Miles Heizer (13 Reasons Why and Parenthood) as a bullied gay high school student who joins the Marine Corp with his straight best friend, to be played by newcomer Liam Oh. The cast will include Zach Roerig (Vampire Diaries), Joy Osmanski (Stargirl), Kieron Moore (Vampire Academy) [among others]. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Jesse Spencer will be back on Chicago Fire for the long-running dramas season 11 finale, but Taylor Kinney will not appear in that season ender, as he is still on a leave of absence from the show. (TV Line)

Connie Britton will not return as Nicole on the third season of The White Lotus. (TV Line)

Slumdog Millionaire actress Freida Pinto will appear in the Apple TV+ series Surface, joining Gugu Mbathu-Raw, as Raw’s character Sophie returns to her hometown of London and rediscovers the unfinished relationships that have haunted her memories. (Variety)

Jonathan Groff (Hamilton and Glee) will appear in the latest season of Doctor Who. There is no word on what role he will be playing, though. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Christina Hendricks (Mad Men and Good Girls) will star in the box office movie Reckoner about an affluent woman’s carefully constructed life, which is disrupted by a young man connected to a tightly-held secret from her past. (Variety)

Jake Gyllenhaal, Henry Cavill and Eiza Gonzalez will star in the next Guy Ritchie big-budget, as-yet-untitled action movie that is rumored to revolve around two extraction specialists who must plan an escape path for a high-level female negotiator. (Deadline)

Andrew Garfield and Daisy Edgar-Jones will star in the upcoming box office movie Voyagers, the story of the romantic relationship between astronomer and author Carl Sagan and documentary producer and director Ann Druyan. The movie unfolds in 1977 as NASA prepared to launch humanity’s first interstellar probes. A team led by Sagan sets out to create a message to accompany them, known as the Golden Record, which included music and images, for possible alien civilizations. (Variety)

Martin Freeman (Sherlock and The Hobbit) and young actress Isla Gie (The Sandman) will star in the upcoming feature film The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie: A Flavia de Luce Mystery that follows the adventures of 11-year-old Flavia de Luce (Gie), who is both an amateur detective and a master poisoner. When she discovers a dead body in her family’s decaying British manor house and her father is accused of the murder, Flavia launches her own investigation to uncover family secrets and bring the true murderer to justice. (Variety)

Alan Ritchson (Reacher and Titans) will star in the box office action thriller Motor City, playing John Miller, a Detroit man released from prison, who unleashes a rampage of brutal vengeance on those who framed him. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

Apple TV+ has pulled the plug on the Octavia Spencer drama Truth Be Told after three seasons, but the streaming service has given a fourth season renewal to The Morning Show, which stars Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon. (TV Line)

FALL LINE-UP ADDITION

The CW has actually added a new drama to its fall 2023 line-up despite its recent ownership change. The network will air the Canadian series Sullivan’s Crossing based on the novels by Robyn Carr (who is the author of the books for which the Netflix series Virgin River are based). The series will star Morgan Kohan (When Hope Calls) as a neurosurgeon, who returns to her small hometown in the wake of a professional scandal. The series will also star Scott Patterson of Gilmore Girls fame and Chad Michael Murray from ONe Tree Hill. (The Hollywood Reporter)

TV SERIES ORDER NEWS

Looks like the husband and wife producing team Daniel Palladino and Amy Sherman-Palladino will be sticking around Amazon, as they have been handed a two-season, 16-episode order for the new ballet themed series Étoile, which will feature The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel alums Luke Kirby and Gideon Glick. The series will be set in New York City and Paris, following the dancers and artistic staff of two world-renowned ballet companies, as they embark on an ambitious gambit to save their storied institutions by swapping their most talented stars. (TV Line)

Movie star Keira Knightley will star as Helen in the Netflix series Black Doves. The series follows a woman with a secret identity who embarks on a passionate affair. When her lover falls victim to London’s shadowy underworld, Helen’s employers send an old friend, Sam, to protect her. The two of them soon embark on a high octane adventure set against a backdrop of diplomatic tension and Christmas. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Brandon Larracuente, who plays Dr. Danny Perez in The Good Doctor will not be returning to the show on a full-time basis for season 7; however, he could return as a guest star. (TV Line)

Veteran actor Donale Sutherland has joined the cast of the upcoming Paramount+ series about Bass Reeves that is now using the name Lawmen: Bass Reeves and will star David Oyelowo in the lead role. This anthology series, with future installments set to follow other iconic lawmen who have impacted history in subsequent seasons, will be based around Bass Reeves, known as the greatest frontier hero in American history, who worked in the post-Reconstruction era as a federal peace officer in the Indian Territory, capturing over 3,000 of the most dangerous criminals without ever being wounded. Sutherland will recur as Judge Isaac Parker, an imposing and commanding judge in the Fort Smith Courthouse with a complicated legacy. (Variety)

Friday Night Lights alums Connie Britton and Jesse Plemons will appear alongside Robert De Niro in the upcoming Netflix 6-episode conspiracy thriller series Zero Day that also includes Lizzy Caplan and Joan Allen as part of the cast. De Niro will play George Mullen, a massively popular former American President who is pulled from retirement to head a commission tasked with investigating a devastating global cyber-attack. Britton will play Valerie Whitesell, a savvy political operative who was Mullen’s former Chief of Staff, while Plemons will portray Roger Carlson, Mullen’s former “body man” who is seeking a return to the national stage alongside his onetime boss. Allen will play Sheila Mullen, the former First Lady and nominee to the federal bench while Caplan, will play erstwhile First Daughter Alexandra Mullen, a young Congresswoman who has sought to distance herself from her father’s political legacy. (TV Line)

Gabrielle Union will play the prime suspect in the new murder mystery Pretty Little Wife at Amazon Prime Video. Based on the Darby Kane best-selling novel, the series will be a cat-and-mouse thriller with a pulpy edge and some sexy soap that centers around two brilliant — and very different — Black women: Lily (Union), the pretty little wife suspected of murdering her husband, and Ginny, the detective on the case. Upon entering each other’s lives, they begin to crack open each other’s facade to reveal what really lies beneath. (The Hollywood Reporter)

MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE NEWS

It’s officially official: Hallmark Movies and Mysteries has announced the end of the Mystery 101 franchise of made-for-TV movies that starred Jill Wagner and Kristoffer Polaha in the lead roles. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE MOVIE NEWS

Actress Miriam Shor (Younger) has been cast in the Bradley Cooper movie Maestro, that is a biopic about Leonard Bernstein. She will play Cynthia O’Neal, an actor and model who was a friend of the legendary musician and his wife Felicia Montealegre. Cooper, of course, will play Bernstein in the flick and Carey Mulligan will play his wife. (Variety)

The animated prequel film Transformers One will feature the voices of Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, Scarlett Johansson, Keegan-Michael Key, Jon Hamm and Laurence Fishburne. This will be an origin story about how the brothers-in-arms turned into sworn enemies. (Variety)

Chris Pine has joined the cast of the upcoming Disney animated musical Wish that will also feature Ariana DeBose and Alan Tudyk lending their voices. The film revolves around an intriguing, slightly meta question: How did the wishing star come into the cosmos? The film unfolds in the magical kingdom of Rosas and introduces Asha, an optimist with a sharp wit who deeply cares about her community. When Asha turns to the sky in a moment of need and makes a wish, her plea is answered by a little ball of energy called Star. Together, they team up to save Asha’s community. (Variety)

Joel Kinnaman (For All Mankind and The Killing) wil play the lead in the upcoming alien abduction thriller flick They Found Us. In the film, a father (Kinnaman) and daughter undertake a camping trip in the Utah wilderness to heal their broken relationship. Attacked by a hostile extraterrestrial lifeform, their lives, not just their relationship, are at stake as they fight with a humanoid beast to stop their abduction to an unknown and terrifying alien world. (Variety)

Emily in Paris hottie Lucien Laviscount and Sophie Cookson (Kingsman: The Golden Circle) will star in the box office rom-com This Time Next Year, which is being adapted from the Sophie Cousens novel that charts the story of Minnie (Cookson) and Quinn (Laviscount) who are born in London on New Year’s Day, in the same hospital, one minute apart. Thirty years later — and very different people — they find themselves thrown together again in the same city on New Year’s Eve. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

ABC has given The Rookie and Will Trent a 6th season and 2nd season (respectively renewal orders. ABC has also given The Good Doctor a 7th season renewal; and Station 19 has been given a 7th season renewal as well. (TV Line)

Hulu has given a second season renewal of Reasonable Doubt. (TV Line)

Apple TV+ has pulled the plug on the new drama series Dear Edward after only one season. (TV Line)

Disney+ has pulled the plug on National Treasure: Edge of History. (The Hollywood Reporter)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Ewan McGregor will star in the Amazon Prime Video series Lodi that is currently in development. Set in 1977, car salesman Lou (McGregor) goes from ordinary small-town citizen to FBI informant infiltrating the mafia when a key member of organized crime offers to buy his Cadillac dealership. (Variety)

Lionsgate TV is in very early development of a TV series adaptation of the Stephanie Meyers Twilight franchise of books. (Variety)

Paramount+ is in the early development stages of a small screen version of Galaxy Quest. (Variety)

AMC is developing another series from the world of Anne Rice, focusing on the Talamasca, a secretive organization featured in a number of Rice’s iconic novels that is devoted to studying the supernatural world and keeping mortals safe from its darkest elements. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

As mentioned above Hulu has given a second season renewal for Reasonable Doubt, which will see Morris Chestnut join the cast, playing Corey Cash, a charming and media-savvy defense attorney who Jax brings in to help on a new high-profile case. (TV Line)

Broadway legend Patti LuPone will play a sexy witch named Lilia Calderu in the Disney+ WandaVision spin-off series Agatha: Coven of Chaos. (People)

The O.C. alum Mischa Barton will appear in the new season of Neighbours, the long-running Australian soap opera, which is coming to Amazon Freevee. She will play Reece, an American new to Erinsborough who’s not quite who she appears to be. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE MOVIE NEWS

Actor Brandon Sklenar (1923) will star alongside Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni in the film adaptation of It Ends With Us, based on the Colleen Hoover best-sellig novel. Lively will play Lily Bloom while Baldoni will play Ryle Kincaid. The movie follows Lily, who has a complicated past, as she meets neurosurgeon Ryle while living in Boston. Although she believes she has found her soulmate, over time, she begins to question their relationship. And to complicate things more, her high school love interest, Atlas (to be played by Sklenar), comes back into her life. (The Hollywood Reporter)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS

NBC has given season renewals to all three shows in the Law & Order franchise EXCEPT Organized Crime will have a shorter season than the other two shows. Also the network has renewed Chicago Fire, Chicago Med and Chicago P.D. (TV Line)

Syfy has given a second season renewal to the sci-fi series The Ark. (Variety)

NEW SERIES ORDER

The Duffer Brothers are expanding the Stranger Things world with a series order being given to an as-yet-untitled animated show set in that universe as well as a stage prequel titled The First Shadow that will be unveiled in London’s West End later this year. (TV Line)

HBO has given a greenlight to another Game of Thrones prequel. A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight will be based on George R.R. Martin’s Dunk and Egg novellas. The series will be set a century before the events of Game of Thrones, following two unlikely heroes who wandered Westeros: the young, naive but courageous knight, Ser Duncan the Tall” (aka Dunk) “and his diminutive squire, Egg. (TV Line)

The combined HBO Max and Discovery+ will now be known as Max (yep, you read that right); and a new series based on the Harry Potter novels has been officially ordered. It will be a “faithful adaptation” of each of the seven books in the franchise. At this point, it is unknown if this adaptation will equate to 10 seasons or simply follow a 10-year lifespan for the series. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Blue Bloods viewers will see two familiar faces returning to the long-running series. Jennifer Esposito will be back as Jackie Curatola, Danny’s old partner and Sami Gayle will be back as Nicky Reagan-Boyle. (TV Line)

Kelli Giddish will be back as Amanda Rollins on Law & Order: SVU for the show’s upcoming season finale as well as in the penultimate episode of Law & Order: Organized Crime. (TV Line)

The animated series Creature Commandos, which will premiere in 2024 as the first title in the new DC Universe (headed by James Gunn and Peter Safran) will include David Harbour, Indira Varma, Frank Grillo and Alan Tudyk [among others] as voices of Eric Frankenstein, the Bride of Frankenstein, Rick Flag Sr., and Doctor Phosphorus respectively. (Variety)

STREAMING SERVICE MOVIE NEWS

Samuel L. Jackson and John David Washington will star in the Netflix feature film The Piano Lesson, which is an adaptation of the August Wilson play, reprising their roles from the highly successful Broadway revival. Set in 1936 Pittsburgh during the aftermath of the Great Depression, the film will follow the lives of the Charles family, a household led by Doaker Charles (Jackson), and an heirloom, the family piano, which is decorated with designs carved by an enslaved ancestor. Washington will play Boy Willie, Doaker’s nephew, a role. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Billy Porter will portray author and civil rights activist James Baldwin in an upcoming biopic that will be adapted from the 1994 book by David Leeming, who will co-write the untitled movie with Porter. (Variety)

Buzz-about actress Mia Goth will star opposite Oscar winner Mahershala Ali in the upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe movie Blade, but details on her role are being kept under wraps. (Variety)

It looks like Glen Powell (Top Gun: Maverick) will be starring alongside Daisy Edgar-Jones (Where the Crawdads Sing) in the movie Twisters, the sequel to the 1996 Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt flick Twister. Plot details are being kept under wraps. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items from this past week:

CANCELLATIONS

FOX has pulled the plug on the medical drama The Resident after six seasons. (TV Line)

Netflis has pulled the plug on the drama Sex/Life after two seasons. (TV Line)

SERIES ORDER NEWS

FOX has given a series order to the first series of the 2023-2024 TV season. That new series is Doc,, a medical drama based on an Italian format that would center on the Dr. Amy Elias — chief of internal and family medicine at a Minneapolis hospital, who’s also recovering from a brain injury that has wiped out the last eight years of her memory. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Hulu has ordered to series a new, untitled drama that would find This Is Us creator Dan Fogelman and series alum Sterling K. Brown reuniting on the small screen. There are no specific details on the plot as yet, but it has been described as a thriller and say Brown would star as the head of security for a former president. (Variety)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Amazon is developing a series based on the novel Clans of the Alphane Moon by the late Philip K. Dick that is described as a subversive, genre-bending, sci-fi comedy about desperately trying to escape, and ultimately having to embrace our flaws, told through the prism of a Latinx family en route to a new, faraway moon. (Variety)

SERIES ORDER NEWS

It’s been a long and winding journey to the small screen for the TV adaptation of the 1999 box office movie Cruel Intentions, but Amazon has placed an 8-episode series order for the production that would be set in Washington, D.C., following two ruthless step-siblings who will do anything to stay at the top of the Greek Life hierarchy at their elite college. When a brutal hazing incident threatens the entire Panhellenic system, they’ll do whatever is necessary to preserve their power and reputation, including seducing the daughter of the U.S. vice president. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

With the announcement of the cancellation of The Resident, lead actor Matt Czuchry is now available to move on to a new project. He will be joining the latest season of the FX series American Horror Story. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Actor Lars Mikkelsen will play Grand Admiral Thrawn in the upcoming Disney+ series Ahsoka that stars Rosario Dawson in the lead role. (Variety)

Hallmark Channel alum and The Bold Type actor Sam Page has joined the cast of Grey’s Anatomy in the recurring role of Sam Sutton, an Air Force pilot who is seriously injured in a base-jumping accident. His first appearance will be during the May 4 episode. (Variety)

Royal Pains lead Mark Feuerstein has joined the cast of the upcoming MGM+ (formerly EPIX) series Hotel Cocaine that will star Danny Pino and Michael Chiklis. The series is about Roman Compte (Pino), a Cuban expatriate who fought against Fidel Castro in the Bay of Pigs invasion and re-made his life in Miami. He is general manager of the Mutiny Hotel, the glamorous epicenter of the Miami cocaine scene of late ‘70s and early ‘80s. The Mutiny Hotel was Casablanca on cocaine, a glitzy nightclub, restaurant and hotel frequented by Florida businessmen and politicians, international narcos, CIA and FBI agents, models, sports stars and musicians. Feuerstein will play Burton Greenberg, the owner of the Mutiny Hotel, the “Studio 54” of Miami. (Deadline)

Game of Thrones alum Kit Harington has joined the cast of the HBO drama Industry for its third season. He will recur as as Henry Muck, the CEO and Founder of Lumi, an exciting green tech energy company that’s about to go public. (Deadline)

Soap star Thad Luckinbill will star opposite Zoe Saldana in the Taylor Sheridan Paramount+ series Lioness, which is based on a real-life CIA program and follows Cruz Manuelos, a rough-around-the-edges but passionate young Marine recruited to join the CIA’s Lioness Engagement Team to help bring down a terrorist organization from within. Saldaña will play Joe, the station chief of the Lioness program tasked with training, managing and leading her female undercover operatives. Thad will play Kyle, an old friend of Joe’s who oversees a trafficking contact. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Actor Damson Idris (from the FX series Snowfall) will star opposite Brad Pitt in the untitled Formula One racing film that will feature Pitt as a former driver who returns to the sport while Idris will play his teammate. (Variety)

Andre Holland, taking over for Ryan Gosling, and Gemma Chan will star in the box office movie The Actor that tells the story of actor Paul Cole (Holland), who finds himself stranded in 1950s Ohio, suffering from severe memory loss after a brutal attack, struggling to find his way back to his life in New York and reclaim what he has lost. (Deadline)

A live-action remake of Moana has been announced by Disney with Dwayne Johnson reprising his role as Maui. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here is the latest news for the past week?

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

CBS has given Blue Bloods a 14th season renewal. (TV Line)

Netflix has given a second season renewal to their new series The Night Agent, a mere six days after its debut. (TV Line)(TV Line)

Paramount+ has given a 3rd season renewal to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. (TV Line)

Billions will come to an end on Showtime after its upcoming 7th season.

EPISODE REDUCTION

The second season of House of the Dragon will consist of only 8 episodes, two fewer than the show’s debut season. (Deadline and TV Line)

REVIVAL NEWS

Director Ryan Coogler is developing a diverse reboot of the The X-Files. (TV Line)

NEW SERIES NEWS

Paramount+ is expanding the Star Trek Universe. A series order has been given to Star Trek: Starfleet Academy that will be run by Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau. (TV Line)

Barrett Foa (NCIS: Los Angeles) will have a recurring role in the upcoming Netflix murder-mystery drama The Residence, which stars Uzo Aduba in the lead role. The 8-episode series is being described as a screwball whodunnit set in the upstairs, downstairs, and back stairs of the White House. Foa will play Elliot Morgan, “the first gentleman” of the White House. The cast includes Randall Park, Andre Braugher, Susan Kelechi Watson, Ken Marino, Jason Lee, Bronson Pinchot [among others]. (Deadline)

Poldark alum Eleanor Tomlinson and Outlander star Sam Heughan will star in the Starz and Channel 4 on British TV have given a greenlight to the thriller The Couple Next Door that follows Evie (Tomlinson) and Pete (Alfred Enoch from Harry Potter), who move into an upscale neighborhood and find themselves in a world of curtain twitching and status anxiety. They find friendship in the shape of the couple next door, alpha traffic cop Danny (Heughan) and his wife, glamorous yoga instructor Becka (Jessica De Gouw), but after Danny and Evie share a passionate night together, there is trouble ahead. (Deadline)

TV CASTING NEWS

It looks like actress Bailey Bass has left the cast of Interview With the Vampire for the show’s second season. Delainey Hayles will take over the role of Claudia for the sophomore season. (TV Line)

Demetrius Grosse (Fear the Walking Dead and Swagger) has signed on to play Eric Williams, the brother of Simon Williams aka Wonder Man (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) in the upcoming Disney+ series Wonder Man that is about a gifted engineer who gains superhuman abilities and becomes an enemy of The Avengers. (TV Line)

Jessica Chastain will star in the 8-episode limited series The Savant at Apple TV+. The series is inspired by a true story published in Cosmopolitan in August 2019; however, exact plot details are being kept under wraps. (Variety)

Lena Headey (Game of Thrones) has joined the cast of The Abandons, from creator Kurt Sutter. The series will focus on a group of diverse, outlier families pursuing their Manifest Destiny in 1850s Oregon. Headey will play Fiona, a strong, devout matriarch who, unable to have her own children, took in four orphans to create her own family. (Variety)

Chris Chalk (Perry Mason) will star as James Baldwin in the latest installment of the Feud franchise from Ryan Murphy: Feud: Capote’s Women. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Matthew Macfadyen (Succession and Pride & Prejudice) has joined the cast of Deadpool 3. (Variety)

Liv Tyler is returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, 16 years after her last appearance. She will appear in next year’s Captain America: New World Order, reprising her role as Betty Ross from The Incredible Hulk. New World Order will star Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson, who took on the mantle of Captain America in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier with the blessing — and the supposed off-screen death — of Chris Evans’ Steve Rogers. Carl Lumbly, Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas and Tim Blake Nelson also star. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

Read Full Post »

Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATION

FOX has given a second season renewal to both Alert: Missing Persons Unit and Accused. (TV Line)

Netflix has given a 5th and final season renewal for the drama You. (TV Line)

Grey’s Anatomy has been given a season 20 renewal by ABC. (TV Line)

Showtime has pulled the plug on The L Word: Generation Q after three seasons. (Deadline and TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Michael Chiklis will star alongside Danny Pino in the upcoming crime thriller series Hotel Cocaine that will debut on MGM+ (formerly EPIX). The story will focus on Roman Compte (Pino), a Cuban expatriate who fought against Fidel Castro in the Bay of Pigs invasion and re-made his life in Miami. He is general manager of the Mutiny Hotel, the glamorous epicenter of the Miami cocaine scene of late ‘70s and early ‘80s. The Mutiny Hotel was Casablanca on cocaine, a glitzy nightclub, restaurant and hotel frequented by Florida businessmen and politicians, international narcos, CIA and FBI agents, models, sports stars and musicians. Chiklis will play Agent Zulio who will stop at nothing to shut down the drug trade, even if it means using innocent civilians to accomplish his ends. (Deadline)

Acclaimed actor Ciaran Hinds will join the cast of the second season of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. His role will be a recurring one, but there is no description on what role he will play, though. (The Hollywood Reporter)

BROADWAY NEWS

Smash, the NBC musical drama, is finally making its way to Broadway for the 2024-2025 season with Tony-winning director Susan Stroman at the helm with a score by the award-winning duo Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who wrote over two dozen songs for the television show and Emmy-winning choreographer Joshua Bergasse, who will reprise his role for the stage adaptation. (TV Line)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

The next project for Robert Downey Jr. just might be a remake of the 1958 classic psychological thriller Vertigo. (Variety)

Daveed Diggs (Hamilton and the small screen adaptation of Snowpiercer) has joined the cast of the new live-action film In the Blink of an Eye that will also star Kate McKinnon and Rashida Jones in the film that will follow three storylines spanning thousands of years, pondering hope, connection and the circle of life. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for the past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

Amazon Prime Video has renewed A League of Their Own for a truncated, 4-episode second and final season. (Puck, The Hollywood Reporter and TV Line)

Meanwhile, Amazon Prmie Video has pulled the plug on the Canada-set mystery series Three Pines, which starred Alfred Molina, after only one season. (Variety)

Disney+ has yanked the small screen adaptation Willow after only one season. (TV Line)

Peacock has given a third season renewal to Bel-Air. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Garrett Hedlun (Tulsa King) has joined the cast of the Taylor Sheridan western drama Bass Reeves that will air on Paramount+. He will play Garrett Montgomery, a posse man hired by Bass Reeves (David Oyelowo) for his riding know-how and expertise of the area. (Collider)

Actress Kelly McCreary will be leaving Grey’s Anatomy at the end of this season. (TV Line)

Rebecca Mader (Once Upon a Time) has joined the cast of the new CBS drama Fire Country in the key recurring role of Faye, the head of a private concierge firefighting company, who meets Manny (series regular Kevin Alejandro) at an AA meeting. Meanwhile Kanoa Goo (The Rookie) will play Kyle, a swim Adonis, who has arrived to attend a swim clinic. (Deadline)

INTERNATIONAL TV NEWS

Outlander alum Richard Rankin has lined up his new project now that Outlander has an end date in sight. Rankin will play Inspector Rebus in the new series Rebus that will air on the Nordic streaming service Viaplay. The series follows 40-year-old Inspector John Rebus at a psychological crossroads following an altercation with an infamous Edinburgh gangster. At odds with a job increasingly driven by technocrats, involved in a toxic affair he knows he needs to end, and all but supplanted in his daughter’s life by his ex-wife’s wealthy new husband, Rebus begins to wonder if he still has a role to play – either as a family man or a police officer. (Deadline)

REUNION MOVIE NEWS

Monk fans will be excited to learn that Peacock has officially ordered a reunion movie for the popular series, and Tony Shalhoub will back as the title character along with returning cast members Ted Levine, Traylor Howard, Jason Gray-Stanford, Melora Hardin (Trudy Monk) and Hector Elizondo. Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie will find Monk returning to solve one final, very personal case involving his beloved stepdaughter Molly, a journalist preparing for her wedding. (TV Line)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Game of Thrones actress and Fast and Furious franchise member Nathalie Emmanuel will star opposite Omar Sy in the upcoming Peacock flick The Killer, which is a reimagining of the 1989 John Woo movie that followed an assassin who takes one last assignment in order to use his earnings to pay for the surgery that will restore the sight of a singer he blinded. Details of this reimagining have yet to be revealed, though. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

NEW SERIES NEWS

Cowboy Way FAST Channel will be the home of the new action-crime series Blue Ridge, which is based on the made-for-TV movie of the same name that debut on INSP TV in 2020. The series will find Johnathon Schaech (That Thing You Do! and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow) reprising his role of Sheriff Justin Wise, a former Green Beret, who leaves his dangerous life to be near his ex-wife and young daughter. As sheriff of a small, sleepy town cut out of the Blue Ridge Mountains, his quiet life is soon disrupted as he tries to keep the mountain community safe from violence and corruption. The first episode of Blue Ridge will debut in late 2023 or early 2024. This new channel can be viewed on Plex and Roku. (INSP TV Press Release)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Amazon Studios is developing a TV series based on the From Blood and Ash novels by author Jennifer L. Armentrout. The series will center on a young woman named Poppy, who is chosen at birth as The Maiden of her kingdom who will “Ascend” and bring in a new era of peace and prosperity. Duty-bound to fulfill her destiny, she’s also isolated from the world. (The Hollywood Reporter)

TV CASTING NEWS

MGM+ has set the cast for Belgravia: The Next Chapter, the sequel series to the Julian Fellowes historical drama. The 8-part series will pick up in 1871, three decades after the events depicted in the 2020 limited series. The series tells the love story of Frederick Trenchard (Ben Wainwright), who has grown up as the third Lord Trenchard, and his new love interest, Clara Dunn (Harriet Slater), who is a newcomer to London society. Unaware that his birth was the product of an affair between his mother Susan and the scoundrel John Bellasis, a troubled childhood has left Frederick deeply insecure, which challenges his courtship of and marriage to Clara. (Deadline)

Jesse Spencer will reprise his role of Matt Casey in an upcoming episode of Chicago Fire. This news comes as longtime series regular Taylor Kinney is taking a leave of absence. (Variety and TV Line)

Lesley-Ann Brandt (Lucifer) has landed a recurring role in the upcoming The Walking Dead spin-off series that will star Andrew Lincoln and Dania Gurira. She will play Pearl Thorne in the six-episode series. (Deadline)

Daniel Bruhl (Captain AMerica: Civil War) will star as late fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld in the upcoming Disney+ original series Kaiser Karl. The 6-part series will chronicle the rise of Karl Lagerfeld through the world of 1970s Parisian high fashion. (Variety)

Peacock is working with Bridgerton alum Rege-Jean Page, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Willmott on an 8-part event series about boxing icon Muhammad Ali. Excellence: 8 Fights will chronicle eight distinct and defining moments in the iconic life of Muhammad Ali. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Octavia Spencer will star in and produce the upcoming box office film Confessions in B-Flat, which will tell an emotional love story that will be set amid the Civil Rights Movement, following two young people, Anita and Jason, who meet and fall in love despite their clashing political beliefs. (Variety)

Julianne Moore and Sydney Sweeney will star in the feature film Echo Valley that will follow Kate Garrett (Moore), a woman reeling from a personal tragedy who spends her days boarding and training horses on the secluded and picturesque Echo Valley Farm. Late one night, her wayward daughter Claire (Sweeney) arrives at her doorstep, frightened, trembling and covered in someone else’s blood. (Variety)

Jason Clarke (Zero Dark Thirty), Scott Eastwood (The Longest Ride and Suicide Squad) and Chaske Spencer (The English and Twilight franchise) will star in Wind River: The Next Chapter, the sequel to the Taylor Sheridan movie Wind River that starred Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Olsen, Gil Birmingham, Graham Greene, Jon Bernthal, and Martin Senmeier. The movie will focus on Sensmeier’s character Chip Hanson—a lost drug addict in the original and the son of Gil Birmingham’s character— reformed and taking a lead role. It is unclear if any other actors from the original pic will make a return, though. (The Playlist)

Ted Lasso actress Hannah Waddingham will star opposite Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible 8. (People)

MADE-FOR-TV MOVIE NEWS

Hallmark Movies & Mysteries announced plans for a new Aurora Teagarden movie that will find Skyler Samuels (The Gifted, Scream Queens and The Nine Lives of Chloe King) taking over the lead role. This prequel-based film called Aurora Teagarden Mysteries: Something New will find Samuels playing a younger version of Aurora with Evan Roderick (Arrow and Spinning Out) as a younger version of Arthur (played by Peter Benson in the original franchise. Marilu Henner will continue to play Aurora’s mom Aida. (TV Line)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

Star Trek: Discovery will end with its upcoming 5th season, which is set to arrive in early 2014. (TV Line)

The Hallmark Channel has given a second season renewal to The Way Home. (TV Line)

ORDERED TO SERIES

The Netflix limited series, political thriller Zero Day, that is set to star Robert De Niro, has been ordered to series. The series will focus on how to find truth in a world in crisis. De Niro is reportedly playing a former President of the United States. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Veteran actor Clancy Brown has joined the HBO Max spin-off series The Penguin (a spin-off of The Batman box office film). He will have the recurring role of Salvatore Maroni, a notorious Gotham City crime boss. (Variety)

Demi Singleton (King Richard and Godfather of Harlem) has joined the cast of the upcoming Paramount+ series Bass Reeves, that will star David Oyelowo in the title role. Singleton will play Sally, the daughter of Bass Reeves and Jennie (Lauren E. Banks). (Variety)

Damian Lewis will be back in the role of Axe in the Showtime series Billions. He left at the end of Season 5. (Variety)

Jamie Dornan will be back as Elliott and Danielle Macdonald will be back as Helen Chambers in the off-beat thriller The Tourist. (Variety)

The Shondaland Netflix series The Residence has added new cast members. Among those new members are Andre Braugher, Jason Lee, Ken Marino, Bronson Pinchot and Susan Kelechi Watson. The series will be a screwball whodunnit set in the upstairs, downstairs and backstairs of the White House. (Variety)

STREAMING MOVIE NEWS

Brooke Shields, Miranda Cosgrove and Benjamin Bratt will star in the new rom-com Netflix movie Mother of the Bride, which will be a generational comedy of errors. When Lana’s daughter Emma returns from a year abroad in London, she drops a bombshell on her mother: she’s getting married. On an island. Next month. Things only get worse when Lana discovers that the mystery man who stole her daughter’s heart just so happens to be the son of the man who broke hers years ago. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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