Rueben's Ramblings

Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS

City of a Hill has been renewed for a third season. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Apple TV has given a second season renewal to The Mosquito Coast. (Variety)

Netflix has renewed the drama Virgin River for a fourth season ahead of the upcoming season three premiere that is set to air on the streaming network on July 9. (Production Weekly and Spoiler TV)

CANCELLATION/DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Unfortunately, Netflix has pulled the plug on Jupiter’s Legacy, the small screen adaptation of the Mark Miller and Frank Quitely graphic novels. However, the streamer is keeping the franchise alive with Supercrooks, a new super villain-themed series set in the Jupiter’s Legacy universe, which centers on a ragtag gang of super-villains, con-artists, petty thieves and leg-breakers who all band together for the heist of the century and the most outrageous crime story you’ve ever seen in your life. (TV Line)

Film legend Jamie Lee Curtis’ production banner Comet Pictures and Blumhouse TV are developing a one-hour series based on author’s Patricia Cornwell character Kay Scarpetta, a forensic pathologist at the center of 24 crime thrillers. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Melissa Barrera (Vida and the soon to be released In the Heights box office movie) has landed the lead role in the Netflix drama Breathe. Barrera will star as Liv, a razor-sharp Manhattan attorney who finds herself profoundly out of her comfort zone when her small plane crashes in the Canadian wilderness and she must battle for survival. (Variety)

Sophie Turner (Game of Thrones and Mrs. Joe Jonas) has joined the cast of the HBO Max TV series The Staircase. The eight-episode series is based on the docuseries of the same name as well as various books and reports about the case of Michael Peterson (Colin Firth), who was accused of murdering his wife, Kathleen (Toni Collette), in 2001. He claimed she died after falling down the stairs at their home, but police suspected he bludgeoned her to death and staged the scene to look like an accident. Turner will play Margaret Ratliff, one of Michael Peterson’s adopted daughters. The cast already includes Parker Posey, Juliette Binoche and Rosemarie DeWitt. (Variety)

Emeraude Toubia (the Freeform fantasy drama Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments) has landed the lead role in the Amazon one-hour romantic comedy series With Love, which follows the Diaz siblings, Lily (Toubia) and Jorge, who are on a mission to find love and purpose. The Diaz siblings cross paths with seemingly unrelated residents during some of the most heightened days of the year –the holidays. Lily is a hopeless romantic with a tight knit Mexican-American family who is on a mission to find real love after breaking up with her perfect on paper boyfriend. (Deadline)

Angie Harmon (Rizzoli & Isles) has signed a multi-picture development deal with Lifetime in which she will executive produce, direct and star for the network. The drama that is currently in development is called Barstow (working title). Harmon will star as a single mother/diner owner whose very dark past keeps coming back to haunt her, despite her desire for a quiet life. (Deadline)

Anuja Joshi has been promoted to series regular for season 5 of The Resident where she has been recurring as Dr. Leela Devi since last season. (Deadline and TV Line)

STREAMING NEWS

Teagan Croft (Titans) will star in a new family film True Spirit for Netflix. She will play Jessica Watson in a story based on the real-life memoir of the same title, which details her solo sailing journey around the world. Told from Jessica’s perspective, the movie will recall her travels as a 16-year-old Australian sailor which took her once around the globe in 210 days. Jessica is the youngest person to sail solo, non-stop and unassisted around the world. She took on the massive challenge in 2010 and survived seven knockdowns while at sea. (The Hollywood Reporter and Digital Spy)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Hamilton alum Phillipa Soo, Simu Liu (the lead in Marvel’s upcoming Shang-Chi movie) and Luke Bracey (Netflix’s holiday film Holidate and the Nicholas Sparks movie The Best of Me) will all star in the film adaptation of One True Loves based on the best-seller by author Taylor Jenkins Reid. The film will follow the moving love story of a woman unexpectedly forced to choose between the husband she has long thought dead and the fiancé who has finally brought her back to life. (Variety)

Tiffany Haddish will star as Florence Griffith Joyner – aka Flo-Jo – the Olympian who set world records in the 1988 games; and who died in ten years later at the age of 38 of an epileptic seizure. (Variety)

Issa Rae (Insecure) has joined the cast of the sequel to the 2018 Oscar-winning animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. She will voice the character Jessica Drew, better known as Spider-Woman. Plot details are being kept tightly guarded, though. (Variety)

Cruella has only been out in theatres for a few weeks, but there is already talk about a sequel. (Variety)

Newcomer Maitreyi Ramakrishnan (who broke out in the Netflix coming-of-age dramedy Never Have I Ever) has landed her first film role. She will star in The Netherfield Girls, a romantic comedy with literary pedigree. The film is described as a fresh and contemporary take on “Pride and Prejudice” in the spirit of the Emma Stone teen comedy “Easy A” and “10 Things I Hate About You.” Ramakrishnan will portray Lizzie Bennet, the protagonist of Jane Austen’s classic novel who eventually discovers the man she thinks is Mr. Wrong is in fact Mr. Right. (Variety)

Hunky cousins Robbie Amell (the Amazon comedy Upload) and Stephen Amell (Arrow) will reprise their roles in the sci-fi sequel Code 8: Part II. The plot of the original movie [financed in great part by fans] centered on the 4% of people living in fictional Lincoln City who possess special abilities and are often confronted by advanced, militarized police technology. The sequel will follow the journey of a teenage girl fighting to get justice for her slain brother at the hands of corrupt police officers. After becoming a witness to the cover-up, she becomes a target and enlists the help of an ex-con (Robbie Amell) and his former partner-in-crime (Stephen Amell). Together, they face a highly regarded and well protected police sergeant who will use every tool to prevent himself from being exposed. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWAL/CANCELLATION

Netflix has renewed the Katherine Heigl-Sarah Chalke drama ‘Firefly Lane’ for a second season. (TV Line)

The NBC drama Debris has been cancelled after only one season. (TV Line)

CASTING EXIT

Emily Wickersham has confirmed her exit from NCIS, as her character, Eleanor Bishop, embarks on a covert, undercover mission. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Rupert Evans (Charmed and The Man in the High Castle) has joined the cast of the Netflix period drama Bridgerton, playing Edmund Bridgerton, the loving and devoted husband of Violet Bridgerton. (Netflix Twitter Account)

After appearing in the short-term recurring role of Phillip on This Is Us, Chris Geere has been promoted to series regular for the drama’s final season. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Freddie Stroma (Bridgerton and the Harry Potter movie franchise) will take over the role of Adrian Chase aka Vigilante in the HBO Max spin-off of James Gunn’s Suicide Squad movie that stars John Cena in that role. This straight-to-series order will explore the origins of the character. (Deadline)

Victor Webster (Matchmaker Mysteries movie franchise) will recur on the second season of the Freeform fantasy series Motherland: Fort Salem. Webster plays Blanton Silver, vice president of the United States. When his daughter is discovered to be a witch, Silver tries to adjust to her newfound identity. (Deadline)

9-1-1: Lone Star has promoted Brianna Baker to series regular for the show’s upcoming 3rd season. Baker portrays paramedic Nancy Gillian, who works at the 126 under Captain Tommy Vega (Gina Torres). (TV Line)

The Good Doctor has promoted cast members Noah Galvin and Bria Samone Henderson to series regular for the show’s upcoming 5th season. They play Drs. Wolke and Allen. (TV Line)

Lucien Laviscount (Katy Keene and Scream Queens) will join the cast of the Netflix dramedy Emily in Paris for the show’s 2nd season, playing Alfie, a sarcastic and charming cynic who refuses to speak French or immerse himself in French culture. He and Emily (series lead Lily Collins) have an antagonist relationship that evolves into something more as the season progresses. (TV Line)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS/PICK-UP ORDERS

The Netflix series Sandman, based on the DC comic book series by Neil Gaiman, which follows the people and places affected by Morpheus (Tom Sturridge), the Dream King, as he mends the cosmic — and human — mistakes he’s made during his vast existence. Some of the new cast member include Kirby Howell-Baptiste (Veronica Mars Season 4), who will play Death, Dream’s wiser sister; Jenna Coleman (Doctor Who), who will play Johanna Constantine, a haunted exorcist and Occult Adventuress for Hire; Joely Richardson (Nip/Tuck), who will play Ethel Cripps, a master thief and woman of a thousand identities; David Thewlis (Harry Potter franchise), who will play John Dee, Ethel’s son; Stephen Fry (Gosford Park), who will play Gilbert, the debonair protector of the character Rose Walker and Patton Oswalt (The King of Queens), who will provide the voice of Matthew the Raven, Dream’s trusted emissary. The series is already set to star Gwendoline Christie, Boyd Holbrook and Charles Dance [among others]. (Variety)

The NBC streaming service Peacock has given a 10-episode, straight-to-series order to Mrs. Davis, a new TV drama from Damon Lindelof (the EP of Lost and Watchmen) and Tara Hernandez (writer on The Big Bang Theory and Young Sheldon. Plot details for the new drama are being kept under wraps, but the show is expected to be an exploration of faith versus technology and an epic battle of biblical and binary proportions. (Variety)

Another Peacock drama is in development with Elizabeth Banks (Charlie’s Angels and The Hunger Games franchise) set to not only co-star, but also direct and executive produce. The series – Red Queen – is based on the best-selling novel by Victoria Aveyard, and is set in a future America where democracy is replaced by a monarchy led by a group of humans with superpowers who rule with an iron fist over those without powers. The story centers on a poor young woman named Mare who discovers that she, too, has powers, which catapults her to become the face of a revolution for the oppressed while searching for the truth behind the greatest mystery of all: how she became so powerful in the first place. Beth Schwartz (EP of Arrow) co-wrote the pilot with author Aveyard and Schwartz will also serve as showrunner.  (TV Line)

Showtime has ordered an anthology series called Super Pumped; with its first season set to focus on the rise of the ride-sharing app Uber with Joseph Gordon-Levitt set to star. Each season will explore a story that rocked the business world to its core and changed culture. (Variety)

Bassett Vance Productions, the production company from Angela Bassett and Courney B. Vance) are teaming up with MTV Entertainment Studios to develop a limited series about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, which left hundreds of Black people dead and entire homes and businesses destroyed. The series will tell the story of the Greenwood district in Tulsa, which at that time was the wealthiest Black community in the United States and known as “Black Wall Street.” (Variety)

STREAMING SERVICES MOVIE

Believe it or not, but Lindsay Lohan is coming back to acting in the yet-to-be-titled Netflix holiday rom-com, playing a newly engaged, spoiled hotel heiress, who gets amnesia after a skiing accident and finds herself in the care of a handsome, blue-collar lodge owner and his precocious daughter in the days leading up to Christmas (think a Christmas-themed version of Overboard). The rest of the cast has not yet been announced. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Aaron Taylor-Johnson, who played Pietro Maximoff aka Quicksilver, will headline Kraven the Hunter, who has connections to Spider-Man. (Variety)

Victoria Pedretti (You and The Haunting of Bly Manor) will star as Love Quinn in the box office adaptation of the 1999 memoir Lucky from “The Lovely Bones” author Alice Sebold. The film will focus on the 18-year-old Alice, then a burgeoning writer in her freshman year at Syracuse University. After being viciously beaten and raped by a stranger in a tunnel near her college campus, the story explores how the traumatic experience shaped the rest of her life. (Variety)

Timothee Chalamet will play the world’s most famous chocolatier in Wonka, a musical based on the early life of Willy Wonka, a prequel film that will explore the upbringing of the man who later created the famous house of confectionary treats. Reps for Chalamet confirm he will be singing and dancing in the movie. (Variety and Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWAL AND RELOCATION

Evil will be moved to Paramount+ (just like SEAL Team and Clarice). (Variety)

The Resident has been renewed for a 5th season by FOX. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Greg Germann has left the hospital. The actor who has been part of the cast of Grey’s Anatomy for four season is exiting the series, but he could pop up again as a guest star. (TV Line)

Rebecca Ferguson (The Greatest Showman and Mission: Impossible franchise) will star in the Apple TV series adaptation of Wool the dystopian novel by Hugh Howey. The story is set in a ruined and toxic future where a community exists in a giant silo underground, hundreds of stories deep. There, men and women live in a society full of regulations they believe are meant to protect them. Ferguson will star as Juliette, an independent and hardworking engineer. (Variety)

Jeremy Irvine is expected to join the cast in the role of Alan Scott in the HBO Max upcoming Green Lantern TV series, joining Finn Wittrock, who has the lead role. Scott was Earth’s first Green Lantern, who, true to the comics, is a gay man. (Variety)

You and Jane the Virgin actress Jenna Ortega has been cast in the role of Wednesday Addams in the upcoming Netflix live-action series entitled Wednesday. The 8-episode comedic “coming-of-age tale” charts Wednesday’s years as a student at Nevermore Academy, where 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. (TV Line)

A TV adaptation of the Vampire Academy novels by Richelle Mead has been ordered to series at Peacock with Julie Plec, the executive producer of The Vampire Diaries, and The Vampire Diaries actress Marguerite MacIntyre attached to write. A failed box office movie was released in 2014 with 6 books from the franchise published between 2007 and 2010, focusing on two young women’s friendship, which transcends their strikingly different classes as they prepare to complete their education and enter royal vampire society. (Variety)

Morris Chestnut (The Resident) will star opposite Yaya DaCosta (Chicago Med) in the upcoming FOX family drama Our Kind of People. Chestnut will return as a series regular on The Resident, but he will recur on the medical drama. (Deadline and TV Line)

Noah Mills (The Brave and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) has joined the cast of NCIS: Hawai’i, the new spin-off that will debut this fall. Mills will play Jesse, a former big city homicide detective who’s settled in a new life in Hawai‘i. An expert interrogator with a knack for good old fashioned police work, but he’s also a devoted family man who runs 4-H camping trips for his kid. He knows every nook and cranny of the island’s hiking trails. He’s worked with Jane Tennant, the lead character in the series (Vanessa Lachey), the longest and is her lieutenant and sometimes confidant. (Variety)

Arnold Schwarzenegger is finally coming to the small screen in an untitled global espionage adventure project, which has been ordered to series by Netflix. The show centers on a father and a daughter who learn that they’ve been secretly working as CIA Operatives for years. They realize that their entire relationship has been a lie and that they truly don’t know one another at all. (Variety)

CANCELLATION NEWS

The UK series Bulletproof that has been airing here in the States on The CW has been cancelled because of the multiple allegations of sexual harassment leveled against series star and co-creator Noel Clarke. (TV Line)

YOUR TIME IS UP

Glenn Gordon Caron, the showrunner for the CBS series Bull, is no longer in charge, following an internal investigation by CBS Studios after a number of writers quit the show when it wrapped production on Season 5, accusing Caron of “fostering a disrespectful work environment.” Also, series co-star Freddy Rodriguez is exiting the show, but no reason for his departure has been given. (The Hollywood Reporter and TV Line)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Hamilton alum Leslie Odom Jr. and actress Kate Hudson have joined the star studded cast of Knives Out 2. (Variety)

The long awaited movie adaptation of the popular BBC TV series Luther, which stars Idris Elba in the lead role is happening with production expected to start in September. (Variety)

Hocus Pocus 2 is going to happen with Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy and Sarah Jessica Parker all set to reprise their roles. Production will begin this fall with the sequel set to debut on Disney+ sometime in 2022. (Variety)

After playing Superman and the lead role in the Netflix sci-fi series The Witcher, Henry Cavill is set to take on another iconic role: Highlander. The 1986 fantasy adventure film spawned an entire pop-culture ecosystem, including sequels, TV series, tie-in novels, comics, and video games. It is being stated that Cavill’s role is unclear, however. (Variety)

Josh Duhamel will join Mel Gibson and Elisha Cuthbert in the box office film Bandit, an action thriller based on the best-selling novel by author Robert Knuckle and interviews by journalist Ed Arnold about Robert Whiteman (nee Gilbert Galvan Jr.) when he was dubbed the Flying Bandit for successfully pulling off 63 bank and jewelry heists during a notorious crime spree. The movie follows the career criminal (Duhamel) after he escapes from a U.S. prison and crosses the border into Canada, where he assumes a new identity. After falling in love and getting married, he claims to take a job as a traveling security consultant, but his daring crimes continue. After he turns to lifetime gangster Tommy (Gibson) for an investment, his career becomes more complicated and he gets embroiled in the biggest heist in Canadian history, one that puts him at the center of a cross-country manhunt. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

Hallmark Channel has renewed ‘When Calls the Heart’ for a ninth season. (Entertainment Tonight)

Grey’s Anatomy will be back for an 18th season while Station 19 will be back for its 5th season. (TV Line)

FOX has cancelled Prodigal Son after two seasons. (TV Line)

UPFRONT NEWS

ABC has cancelled the dramas For Life and Rebel, while renewing The Rookie and A Million Little Things. The network has picked up the new drama Queen; and a reboot of the comedy Wonder Years (which I’m including only because of Dule Hill playing the patriarch). (Variety and TV Line)

NBC has announced that This Is Us will come to an end with its sixth season that will air during the 2021-2022 TV season. The shows on the bubble – Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, Manifest, Debris and Good Girls are currently MIA but they have NOT been cancelled yet. The network has picked up three new dramas: Ordinary Joe, La Brea and the new spin-off Law & Order: For the Defense. (The Hollywood Reporter and TV Line)

CBS has moved SEAL Team and Clarice over to Paramount+ for each show’s new season, and the network has picked up the new drama Good Sam for the fall TV season. Meanwhile, the legal drama All Rise has been cancelled after two seasons. (Variety)

The CW is going to add Saturday night programming to its weekly line-up, finally becoming a seven-nights-a-week network. This will happen starting on October 2. (TV Line)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

AMC is working with executive producer Peter Ocko (Lodge 49 and Black Sails) on Moonhaven, a new 6-episode suspense thriller set in a utopian community on the moon, centering on Bella Sway, a lunar cargo pilot and smuggler who’s accused of a crime and finds herself marooned on Moonhaven, a 500-square-mile utopian community on the moon that was built to find solutions to problems on Earth. She gets pulled into a conspiracy to control the artificial intelligence that runs the community, teaming with a local detective to stop forces that want to destroy Earth’s last hope. (The Hollywood Reporter)

A spin-off limited series to Bridgerton about a young Queen Charlotte has been ordered to series at Netflix. The series will delve into the origin story of Queen Charlotte as well as young Violet Bridgerton and Lady Danbury. (Variety)

FOX has given a straight-to-series order for Accused, a drama series from show creators David Shore (House) and Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa (both from Homeland) that will be based on the BBC series of the same name. It will be a crime anthology where each episode opens in a courtroom on the accused without knowing their crime or how they ended up on trial; told from the defendant’s point of view. Viewers will discover how an ordinary person got caught up in an extraordinary situation, ultimately revealing how one wrong turn leads to another, until it’s too late to turn back. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Greg Grunberg (Alias and Felicity) will guest star in this week’s episode of 9-1-1: Lone Star, playing someone who Tommy Vega (Gina Torres) encounters at the hospital while following up on her husband’s emergency that played out in the final seconds of last week’s episode. (TV Line)

Gillian Anderson will move from playing the prime minister of the U.K. to the mother of a future empress in her next TV role. Anderson (The Crown, Sex Education) has joined the cast of Hulu’s The Great in a recurring role. She’s set to appear in two episodes of season two as Joanna, Catherine’s (Elle Fanning) mother. Joanna is a glamorous socialite known as “the maestro of marriage” for her ability to arrange partnerships for her daughters. After hearing rumors of Catherine’s coup, she travels to Russia to see for herself. Though she’s a doting mom and Catherine loves her, Joanna may also have more sinister motives. (The Hollywood Reporter)

More cast members have been added to the HBO 5-episode limited series White House Plumbers based on the book by Egil “Bud” Krogh and Matthew Krogh (as well as public records) that follows how Watergate masterminds E. Howard Hunt (Woody Harrelson) and G. Gordon Liddy (Justin Theroux) accidentally toppled the Nixon presidency that they had been trying to protect. Gary Cole will play Mark Felt, the “incorruptible” deputy director of the FBI; Zak Orth (Revolution) will play Alfred Baldwin, a former FBI agent who answers a want-ad in a trade magazine to operate surveillance equipment, and becomes the Plumbers’ eyes and ears; Tony Plana (Ugly Betty) will play Eugenio “Muscolito” Martinez, a “hardened but melancholy” CIA commando who walks away from a failing marriage to help the Plumbers destroy the Democrats; and John Carroll Lynch will play John Mitchell, Nixon’s formidable and corrupt former Attorney General who is now the head of Nixon’s re-election campaign. The join the cast, which already includes Lena Headey, Domhnall Gleeson, Kiernan Shipka, Ike Barinholtz, Yul Vazquez, David Krumholtz, Rich Sommer, Kim Coates and Liam James. (Variety)

24 and Designated Survivor lead Kiefer Sutherland will star in a new drama series at Paramount Plus that has yet to be titled. The 8-episode series will find private espionage operative James Weir (Sutherland) in the midst of a battle over the preservation of democracy in a world at odds with misinformation, behavioral manipulation, the surveillance state and the interests that control these extraordinary powers. (Variety)

Emily Blunt will star in The English, a 6-part Western series under production by the BBC and Amazon Studios. The series will be set in the mid-American landscape of 1890, following Cornelia Locke (Blunt), an Englishwoman who arrives into the new and wild landscape of the West to get revenge on the man she sees as responsible for the death of her son. Upon meeting Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer from the Twilight movie franchise and the TV series Banshee), an ex-cavalry scout and member of the Pawnee Nation by birth, they join together and discover a shared history which must be defeated at all costs, if either of them are to survive. The cast will include Rafe Spall (Men in Black: International), Tom Hughes (A Discovery of Witches), Stephen Rea (The Crying Game), Toby Jones (the Avengers franchise) and Ciaran Hinds (Justice League). [among others]. (Variety)

Lauren Lyle (who plays Marsali on Outlander) will play lead character DS (that’s short for Detective Sergeant) Karen Pirie in the small screen adaptation of the Val McDermid novel “The Distant Echo,” a young and fearless Scottish investigator in the ITV (British network) drama series. (The National, National Newspaper in Scotland)

Stacey Abrams, the two-time New York Times best-selling author, fervent voting activist and former member of the Georgia House of Representatives, will see a small screen adaptation of her novel “While Justice Sleeps” that follows Avery Keene, a brilliant young law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Wynn, whose descent into a coma plunges the court, and the country, into turmoil and turns Avery’s life upside down. She is immediately notified that Justice Wynn has left instructions for her to serve as his legal guardian and power of attorney. Plunged into an explosive role she never anticipated, Avery discovers not only that Justice Wynn had been secretly researching one of the most controversial cases before the court — a proposed merger between an American biotech company and an Indian genetics firm, which promises to unleash breathtaking results in the medical field, but also that Justice Wynn suspected a dangerous conspiracy that infiltrates the highest power corridors of Washington. (Variety)

Torrey DeVitto and Yaya DaCosta will both leave Chicago Med at the end of this season, the show’s 6th season. While DeVitto doesn’t have a new TV gig lined up, she will appear in the upcoming indie film Skelly while DaCosta has been cast in the lead role of the upcoming FOX drama series Our Kind of People, that takes place in the aspirational world of Oak Bluffs on Martha’s Vineyard, a historical stronghold where the rich and powerful Black elite have come to play for over 50 years. The series will follow strong-willed, single mom Angela Vaughn (DaCosta) as she sets out to reclaim her family’s name and make an impact with her revolutionary hair care line that highlights the innate, natural beauty of Black women. But she soon discovers a dark secret about her mother’s past that will turn her world upside-down and shake up this community forever. (TV Line, Deadline and Variety)

Jenna Dewan (Witches of East End) was featured in the promo for this Sunday’s season finale of The Rookie, she will play Nolan’s new neighbor and romantic interest. [By the way, The Rookie was renewed for another season.] What wasn’t shown in that promo was that Bob Morley (The 100) will appear as someone “who threatens to be a big problem for Lucy Chen in her undercover operation. (TV Line)

TV MOVIE NEWS

A third Psych movie is coming to Peacock with James Roday Rodriguez and Dule Hill reprising their roles of Shawn and Gus. The movie title is Psych 3: This Is Gus and it picks up on the eve of Gus and Selene’s (Jazmyn Simon) shotgun wedding and the birth of their first child, “Baby Guster.” Before the nuptials can go down, Shawn and ‘Groomzilla’ Gus must embark on a mission to track down Selene’s estranged husband. Meanwhile, Lassiter (Timothy Omundson) grapples with the future of his career. Maggie Lawson, Kirsten Nelson and Corbin Bernsen will also be back too. (TV Line)

Did you watch the Netflix movie Enola Holmes? Well, a sequel is being planned with both Millie Bobby Brown (from Stranger Things) and Henry Cavill (Superman himself) returning in the title role and Sherlock Holmes respectively. (Variety)

The next live TV musical on NBC will be Annie Live, expected to air during the holidays. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE NEWS

Quite a number of stars are joining the cast of Knives Out 2, where they will try to outmaneuver Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig). They include Kathryn Hahn (WandaVision), Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy), Janelle Monae (Hidden Figures) and Edward Norton (Motherless Brooklyn). Plot details are being kept tightly under wraps, but chances are somebody will die mysteriously and there will be many, many suspects with iffy alibis, delicious backstories and ample motivation to commit murder. (Deadline and Variety)

Actress-director Regina King (A Night in Miami) will be taking the helm of a film adaptation of Bitter Root, the Harlem Renaissance-set comic book series that is set during 1924 that follows a fractured family of once-great monster hunters who face an unimaginable evil that descends upon New York City. For generations, the Sangeryes have hunted and cured those infected by a supernatural force that feeds off the prejudice of the era, transforming humans into monsters. With most of the kin dead, the surviving Sangeryes have the unenviable choice to save or kill the creatures in hopes of thwarting an invasion. (Variety)

James McAvoy (His Dark Materials and X-Men franchise) and Sharon Horgan (the Amazon series Catastrophe) will star in the box office movie Utopia that is set during the first days of the COVID-19 lockdown in March 2020 until the present day, telling the story of a husband and wife who are forced to re-evaluate themselves and their relationship during lockdown. Horgan will play a charity worker who is a coordinator for all of Europe at a refugee charity, while McAvoy will play a self-employed man who runs a boutique computing consultancy. He’s been forced to furlough his staff and take up growing vegetables. The couple share a 10-year-old son, who is the one thing that has kept his parents’ relationship together until lockdown. (Variety)

Gemma Arterton (Prince of Persia and Black Narcissus) and Shazad Latif (Star Trek: Discovery) will join James Norton (The Nevers and Grantchester) in the thriller Chasing Agent Freegard, based on the story of British conman Robert Hendy-Freegard, who masqueraded as an MI5 agent and fooled several people into going underground for fear of assassination by the IRA. (Variety)

Oscar Isaac (Star Wars franchise) will star in the revenge thriller The Card Counter. The story follows Tell (Isaac), whose spartan existence on the casino trail is shattered when he is approached by Cirk (Tye Sheridan), a vulnerable young man seeking help to execute his plan for retribution on a military colonel (Willem Dafoe). Tell sees a chance at redemption through his relationship with Cirk, but keeping him on the straight-and-narrow proves impossible and drags Tell back into his dark past. Tiffany Haddish also stars. (Variety)

Boyd Holbrook (the Quibi series The Fugitive and the box office film Logan) and Shaunette Renee Wilson (The Resident) have joined the cast of the upcoming box office film Indiana Jones 5, but no details are available about what roles they will play. The film will be release in July 2022. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

Read Full Post »

Hi All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

The CW has renewed DC’s Stargirl for a third season before the second season is set to air this summer; and the new drama Kung Fu has been given a second season renewal. (TV Line)

ABC has renewed The Good Doctor for season 5; and the new drama Big Sky has been given a second season renewal. (TV Line)

FX gave Mayans M.C. a fourth season renewal. (TV Line)

Netflix has pulled the plug on the Sherlock Holmes-adjacent drama The Irregulars after only one season. (TV Line)

Fan efforts actually work sometimes. Case in point: Sanditon, the PBS small screen adaptation of the final, unfinished book by Jane Austen. The fan favorite series is actually coming back for TWO seasons with Rose Williams back as heroine Charlotte Heywood. Unfortunately Theo James will NOT be back as Sidney. Other casting will be announced at a later date. (TV Line)

The Stana Katic cop drama Absentia will not be back, as it has come to an end after its previously released third season. (TV Line)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

NBC is expanding the Law & Order franchise with a straight-to-series order for Law & Order: For the Defense, which will take a look inside a criminal defense firm, putting the lawyers under the microscope, along with the criminal justice system with every week delivering the promise of a contemporary morality tale. (Variety)

The twin music duo Tegan and Sara have a best-selling memoir “High School” that will be adapted as an original series for IMDbTV with actress-writer-director Clean DuVall serving as executive producer. The coming-of-age scripted series will be a transcendent story of first loves and first songs that will be told through a backdrop of 90’s grunge and rave culture, weaving between parallel and discordant memories of twin sisters growing up down the hall from one another. (Variety)

EPIX has given a greenlight to a one-hour, eight-episode series about Billy the Kid, that will be an epic romantic adventure about the famous American outlaw whose real name was William H. Bonney, chronicling from his humble Irish roots, to his early days as a cowboy and gunslinger in the American frontier, to his pivotal role in the Lincoln County War and beyond. (The Futon Critic)

SERIES PICK-UPS

FOX has picked up the drama Monarch for the fall TV season. The series is about a Texas-sized, multi-generational musical drama about America’s first family of country music. The Romans are fiercely talented, but while their name is synonymous with honesty, the very foundation of their success is a lie. When their reign as country royalty is put in jeopardy, Nicky Roman, the heir to the crown, already battling an industry stacked against her, will stop at nothing to protect her family’s legacy. (The Futon Critic)

STREAMING SERVICE POTENTIAL

For those who have access to the cable network EPIX, you are aware of the period piece drama Pennyworth, starring Jack Bannon as a young Alfred Pennyworth, the former British SAS soldier who ends up working for young billionaire Thomas Wayne (Ben Aldridge), the father of Bruce Wayne aka Batman. Well, if you don’t get EPIX, you may just be able to see Pennyworth at some point via HBO Max. It looks like the two networks just might be “sharing” the show IF Pennyworth returns for a third season. Should that renewal happen, both EPIX and HBO Max will have all three seasons available for viewing. A deal has not been officially made just yet. (The Hollywood Reporter)

TV CASTING NEWS

Erika Alexander (Living Single and Black Lightning), Derek Luke (13 Reasons Why) and Sam Trammell (True Blood) will star in the EPIX TV movie American Refugee, that tells the story of a family seeking shelter in a neighbor’s bunker (Trammell), while the American economy is in collapse and the nation under martial law. There they find the danger inside is potentially greater than the danger outside. (Deadline)

More cast members have been announced for the revival of Nash Bridges that will return as a two-hour movie at the USA Network. Don Johnson, Cheech Marin and Jeff Perry will be reprising their roles with Bonnie Somerville (Code Black) and Joe Dinicol (Arrow) among the additions. Somerville will play Christina Hunter, a psychiatrist who contracts with SIU to evaluate cops; while Dinicol will play Steven Colton, a by-the-book millennial cop. (Deadline)

Amazon Studios has won the rights to adapt the sci-fi podcast From Now into a TV series with Richard Madden and Brian Cox in the lead roles and as executive producers since they appeared in the podcast. Madden and Cox play identical twin brothers separated by time. The story chronicles the aftermath of their historic reunion when astronaut Edward Fitz’s (Madden) spacecraft suddenly reappears in Earth’s orbit after having gone missing 35 years earlier and Edward emerges looking the exact same age as when he left. (Deadline)

Elodie Yung (Daredevil) will star in the upcoming FOX drama The Cleaning Lady in this fall’s TV season. The show is based on the Argentinian series La Chica Que Limpia that focuses on Thony (Yung), a whip-smart doctor who comes to the U.S. for a medical treatment to save her ailing son; but when the system fails and pushes her into hiding, she refuses to be beaten down and marginalized. Instead, she becomes a cleaning lady for the mob and starts playing the game by her own rules. The show will also star Adan Canto (Designated Survivor). (Variety)

After 12 seasons playing Dr. Jackson Avery, Jesse Williams will be leaving the cast of Grey’s Anatomy. (TV Line)

The Netflix drama Sweet Magnolias has promoted Jamie Lynn Spears, Dion Johnstone and Brandon Quinn to series regulars for the show’s second season, which is currently in production and expected to premiere in 2022. Based on the popular series of novels by Sherryl Woods, follows lifelong best friends Maddie (JoAnna Garcia Swisher), Dana Sue (Brooke Elliott), and Helen (Heather Headley) as they juggle relationships, family, and careers in the charming small town of Serenity, SC. Spears plays Noreen Fitzgibbons, the pregnant former mistress of Bill Townsend, Maddie’s now ex-husband; Johnstone plays Erik Whitley, the sous chef at Sullivan’s restaurant, and supportive friend to Dana Sue; and Quinn plays Ronnie Sullivan, Dana Sue’s estranged husband. (Deadline)

True Blood and Big Little Lies alum Alexander Skarsgard has landed a recurring role on the HBO drama Succession, playing Lukas Matsson, a successful, confrontational tech founder and CEO. And, Oscar winner Adrien Brody (The Pianist) has also joined the cast, playing Josh Aaronson, a billionaire activist investor who becomes pivotal in the battle for the ownership of Waystar. (TV Line and Variety)

Luke Evans has joined the cast of the upcoming 10-episode Apple action-thriller series Echo 3 that will be set in South America, following Amber Chesborough, a brilliant young scientist, who is the emotional center of a small American family. But, when she goes missing along the Colombia and Venezuela border, her brother, Bambi (Evans), and her husband — two men with deep military experience and complicated pasts — struggle to find her in a drama set against the explosive backdrop of a secret war. (Variety)

Paul Guilfoyle will reprise his role of homicide detective captain Jim Brass in the upcoming reboot of CSI, joining returning cast members William Petersen, Jorja Fox and Wallace Langham. He will appear in just two episodes of CSI: Vegas, which will debut this fall on CBS. The tagline for the reboot of the series is: Facing an existential threat that could bring down the Crime Lab, a brilliant new team of forensic investigators must welcome back old friends and deploy new techniques to preserve and serve justice in Sin City. (Deadline and TV Line)

Elizabeth Olsen will star in the new HBO Max limited series Love and Death that is based on the true story of Texas housewife Candy Montgomery (Olsen), who murdered her friend from church, Betty Gore, with an axe in 1980. The limited series hails from writer and executive producer David E. Kelley with Nicole Kidman also serving as an executive producer. (Variety)

Tom Cavanagh and Carlos Valdes will be leaving The Flash at the end of this current season, the show’s 7th on The CW. (TV Line)

Billy Crudup has signed on to star in the Apple dramedy Hello Tomorrow, a 10-episode ½-hour series set in a retro-future world, centering around a group of traveling salesmen hawking lunar timeshares. Crudup will play Jack, a salesman of great talent and ambition, whose unshakeable faith in a brighter tomorrow inspires his coworkers, revitalizes his desperate customers, but threatens to leave him dangerously lost in the very dream that sustains him. (Variety)

Ali Wong (Always Be My Maybe) will appear in the upcoming Amazon adaptation of Paper Girls, which follows four young girls who, while out delivering papers on the morning after Halloween in 1988, become unwittingly caught in a conflict between warring factions of time-travelers, sending them on an adventure through time that will save the world. As they travel between our present, the past, and the future — they encounter future versions of themselves and now must choose to embrace or reject their fate. Wong will play Adult Erin – the woman twelve-year-old Erin Tieng (Riley Lai Nelet) grows up to become. When the two Erins finally come face-to-face, they are forced to confront the gap between their childhood hopes, dreams, ambitions and the reality of their grown-up life. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE CASTING NEWS

Hannah John-Kamen (Killjoys and Ant-Man and the Wasp) will star as Red Sonja in the long-gestating feature adaptation of the sword-wielding comic book fantasy hero that was last played by Brigitte Nielsen back in 1985. (Variety)

Harry Golding (Crazy Rich Asians) will star alongside Dakota Johnson in the Netflix adaptation of the Jane Austen novel Persuasion, which will be a modern-day retelling of the romantic drama, centering on the conforming Anne Elliot (Johnson), who lives with her snobby family on the brink of bankruptcy. When Anne reconnects with Frederick Wentworth, a man she was once persuaded to reject, she faces a second chance at love. Golding will play Anne’s cousin Mr. Elliot. The character of Frederick Wentworth has yet to be cast. (Variety)

Mark Wahlberg will star in the Antoine Fuqua-directed sci-fi thriller Infinite that will debut exclusively on the streaming service Paramount Plus (formerly CBS All Access). The movie centers on a man named Evan McCauley (Wahlberg), who is haunted by the fact that he demonstrates skills he has never learned and has memories of places he has never visited. After encountering a secret group that call themselves “Infinites,” he discovers that his memories are real – but they are from multiple past lives. The cast will include Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sophie Cookson, Rupert Friend, Toby Jones and Dylan O’Brien. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

PICK-UP NEWS

FOX has ordered the one-hour dramedy The Big Leap for the 2021-2022 TV season. The show is inspired by the UK docuseries Big Ballet about a diverse, down-on-their-luck characters, who are attempting to change their lives by participating in a potentially life-ruining reality dance show. What this group of underdogs lack in dance training, they make up for with their edge, wit and desire. The cast includes Scott Foley (Scandal), Piper Perabo (Covert Affairs), Teri Polo (The Fosters), Mallory Jansen (Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD), Ser’Darius Blain (Charmed and the Jumanji movie remakes) [among others]. (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Odette Annable has been promoted to series regular for the 2nd season of Walker. (Variety and The Futon Critic)

Vincent Kartheiser (Angel and Mad Men) has joined the cast of the HBO Max (formerly DC Universe) series Titans, appearing as Dr. Jonathan Crane, who – in DC lore – becomes the unhinged supervillain Scarecrow. (Variety and CBR.com)

Josh Hartnett (Penny Dreadful) will star in the original thriller series The Fear Index, based on the best-selling novel by Robert Harris. Hartnett will play Dr. Alex Hoffman, a computer scientist and genius who is ready with a new AI product launch that promises big returns, but whose roll-out plans go awry. What follows is a journey through the worst 24 hours of his life — cutting across reality, memory and paranoid fantasy, forcing him to question everything he sees with his own eyes. (Variety)

The Apple TV series The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey has added new cast members, including Walton Goggins (Justified and The Unicorn), Omar Miller (Ballers), Damon Gupton (Black Lightning) [among others]. They join a cast that already includes Samuel L. Jackson and Dominique Fishback. The show is based on the novel by Walter Mosley, which finds Jackson playing Grey, a 91 year old man forgotten by his family, by his friends, by even himself. On the brink of sinking even deeper into a lonely dementia, Grey experiences a seismic shift when he’s given the tremendous opportunity to briefly regain his memories, and uses this precious and fleeting lucidity to solve his nephew’s death and come to terms with his past. Goggins will play Dr. Rubin; Gupton will play Coydog, Grey’s childhood mentor and Miller will play Reggie Llyod, Grey’s grand nephew. (Variety)

FOX is planning a reboot of Fantasy Island that will debut on August 10. Roselyn Sanchez (Grand Hotel and Devious Maids) will star as Elena Roarke, a descendant of Mr. Roarke from the original series. Elena set aside her own ambitions, and even the love of her life, to uphold her family’s legacy. The new show is described as a modern semi-anthology series that delves into the “what if” questions, both big and small, that keep us awake at night. Each episode will tell stories about people who walk in with a desire, but end up reborn to themselves through the magical realism of Fantasy Island. (Variety)

Domhnall Gleeson (Star Wars) will play a key Watergate figure in the upcoming HBO limited series The White House Plumbers, joining already announced cast members Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux. The 5-part series will tell the story of how President Richard Nixon’s own political saboteurs and Watergate masterminds, E. Howard Hunt (Harrelson) and G. Gordon Liddy (Theroux), accidentally toppled the presidency they were zealously trying to protect. Gleeson will play John Dean, the brilliant, ambitious and youthful White House Counsel that ultimately orchestrates the illegal cover-up that brought down Nixon and his administration. Also, Lena Headey (Game of Thrones) will also appear in the limited series, playing Dorothy Hunt, the wife of E. Howard Hunt. (Variety)

Toni Collette will star alongside Colin Firth in the HBO Max limited series The Staircase. The 8-episode series is based on the docuseries that focused on the case of Michael Peterson (Firth), who was accused of murdering his wife, Kathleen (Collette), in 2001. He claimed she died after falling down the stairs at their home, but police suspected he bludgeoned her to death and staged the scene to look like an accident. (Variety)

JK Simmons will now star opposite Sissy Spacek in the Amazon sci-fi series Lightyears, taking over the lead role from Ed O’Neill who exited the production “for personal reasons.” The series will follow Irene (Spacek) and Franklin (Simmons) York, a couple who years ago discovered a chamber buried in their backyard which inexplicably leads to a strange, deserted planet. They’ve carefully guarded their secret ever since, but when an enigmatic young man enters their lives, the Yorks’ quiet existence is quickly upended and the mysterious chamber they thought they knew so well turns out to be much more than they could ever have imagined. (Variety)

Finn Wittrock (American Horror Story and Ratched) will star as Guy Gardner in the HBO Max 10-episode series Green Lantern, which is based on the DC superhero. (Variety)

The first casting announcement for the new spin-off series NCIS: Hawaii has been made. Vanessa Lachey (BH90210) will star as Jane Tennant, the first woman SAC of NCIS: Hawaii. She is as diplomatic as she is hard-charging. A woman in a male-dominated profession, she’s thrived in a system that’s pushed back every step of the way through equal parts confidence and strategy. But Tennant is more than just a job and a title. She’s a mother raising her kids mostly on her own. Like any parent who loves their career and their family – she’s a master juggler – balancing the duty to both her children and her country. Also, Yasmine Al-Bustami (S.W.A.T. and The Originals) will play Lucy. Confident in the way that reflects a lifetime of achievement and youthful enthusiasm, Lucy is the junior member of Tennant’s NCIS team. She is eager to be the first one to find that key piece of evidence, create a workaround in the bureaucracy, or tackle a suspect down a flight of stairs. And, Jason Antoon (Claws and Fresh Off the Boat) will play Ernie, the Cyber Intelligence Specialist, who is a polyglot with a keen mind for technology, history, literature and all things Hawaiian. He’s an essential component of the team, who can trace an anonymous ip address or profile a suspect using only their social media footprint. Ernie doesn’t have family on the island so he’s invited himself to join his Team’s families. (Variety)

The Rookie creator Alexi Hawley will be working with Netflix “golden boy” Noah Centineo (To All the Boys movie franchise and the Freeform drama The Fosters) in a new drama, tentatively titled Graymail where Centineo will play a fledgling CIA lawyer who becomes involved in dangerous international power politics when a former asset threatens to expose the nature of her long-term relationship with the agency, unless they exonerate her for a serious crime. It should also be noted that Centineo will appear in the upcoming box office movie Black Adam alongside Dwayne Johnson; he will appear as He-Man in a new Masters of the Universe reboot and a new GameStop movie at Netflix. (Cinema Blend)

BOX OFFICE CASTING NEWS

Netflix has another film that will be added to its burgeoning roster. Gunpowder Milkshake will focus on three generations of female assassins who fight to stop a vicious cycle of violence that has haunted their lives. The cast includes Karen Gillan, Lena Heady and Angela Bassett as well as Paul Giamatti, Carla Gugino and Michelle Yeoh. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hi All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

CONGRATS

Here is a salute to the Academy Awards, including director Chloe Zhao, Emerald Fennell, Daniel Kaluuya, Soul, Yuh-Jung Youn (Minari), Frances McDormand, Anthony Hopkins and Nomadland.

RENEWALS

Netflix has renewed Ginny & Georgia for a second season. (TV Line)

CBS has given the go-ahead for the spin-off series NCIS: Hawaii. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Henry Lloyd-Hughes (The Irregulars) and Thalissa Teixeira (The Musketeers) will star alongside Lucy Hale in the six-episode AMC-Alibi series Ragdoll, which is based on the novel by Daniel Cole. Assigned to a shocking new case, nicknamed The Ragdoll, are DS Rose (Lloyd-Hughes), DI Baxter (Teixeira) and DC Edmunds (Hale). The “Ragdoll Killer” taunts the police by sending them a list of his next victims, with Rose’s name at the very end. And with those victims to protect, our heroes soon come under intense public scrutiny. (Variety)

LisaGay Hamilton (The Practice) will recur in the Netflix small screen drama adaptation of The Lincoln Lawyer, playing Mary Holder, presiding judge of the Los Angeles County Superior Court, the most powerful trial judge in the city and a no-nonsense jurist who doesn’t suffer fools. (Deadline and The Futon Critic)

Edgar Ramirez (Netflix’s new movie Yes Day) will star in the 8-episode Netflix series Florida Man, which revolves around a struggling ex-cop who is forced to return to his home state of Florida to find a Philly mobster’s runaway girlfriend. (Variety)

Game of Thrones alum Emilia Clarke is expected to join the cast of the new Marvel Studios series Secret Invasion that is being put together at Disney+ that already boasts Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Kingsley Ben-Adir and Olivia Colman as part of its cast. The series is reported to follow a group of shape-shifting aliens who have been infiltrating Earth for years. Ben-Adir has been set as the main villain, but no word yet on Clarke’s role. (Variety)

Additional cast members have been added to the upcoming HBO drama series about the Los Angeles Lakers: Tracy Letts (Ford v. Ferrari), Julianne Nicholson (Mare of Easttown) and LisaGay Hamilton (The Practice) [among others]. The series chronicles the professional and personal lives of the 1980s Lakers. Letts will play Jack McKinney, the original architect of the Lakers’ fast paced running game; Nicholson will play Cranny McKinney, the coach’s wife; and Hamilton will play Magic Johnson’s mom, Christine Johnson. (Deadline)

Jamie McShane (Bloodline) and Reggie Lee (All Rise and Grimm) will recur in the Netflix small screen adaptation of The Lincoln Lawyer that stars Manuel Garcia-Rulfo and Neve Campbell. Based on the Michael Connelly best-selling novels, the series revolves around Mickey Haller (Garcia-Rulfo), an iconoclastic idealist who runs his law practice out of the back seat of his Lincoln Town Car as he takes on cases big and small across the expansive city of Los Angeles. McShane will play Detective Lee Lankford. A cynical veteran of the police force who is working with Maggie (Campbell), Lankford has a contentious relationship with Mickey. Lee will play Angelo Soto, an intimidating, wealthy businessman who owns a string of successful nursing facilities. He’s under investigation by the DA’s office for possible illegal activity. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE MOVIE NEWS

Downton Abbey will be back on the big screen for a follow-up movie with series creator Julian Fellowes back at the helm and the entire cast returning as well as four new additions, including: Hugh Dancy (Hannibal), Dominic West (The Affair), Laura Haddock (Da Vinci’s Demons and Peter Quill’s mom in the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise) and French actress Nathalie Baye. Their roles are being kept under wraps, as are plot details. (TV Line)

Vin Diesel will be starring in the live-action movie Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em based on the Mattel children’s game, featuring battling robots. (Variety)

Dakota Johnson (from the Fifty Shades of Grey franchise) will be taking the lead in a modern-day approach of Jane Austen’s novel Persuasion that tells the story of Anne Elliot, a headstrong woman living with her snobby family on the brink of bankruptcy. Unmarried and 27-years-old, Anne reconnects with a man she was once persuaded to reject and faces a second chance at love. (Variety)

Oscar Nunez (The Office) will join Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum in the upcoming romantic action comedy The Lost City of D that will center on a romance novelist (Bullock), who gets stuck on a book tour with her cover model (Tatum). Straight out of a novella, a kidnapping attempt sweeps them both into a cutthroat jungle adventure, proving that life can be much stranger — and more romantic — than fiction. What character Nunez will play has yet to be announced. (Variety)

Steven Strait (The Expanse) will star in the high concept sci-fi thriller film Five Below. The plot is being kept under wraps, but is said to be a new take on the meta-human sci-fi genre. (Deadline)

Adria Arjona (Emerald City and Good Omens) will star alongside Andy Garcia in the reboot of Father of the Bride; this time revolving around a Cuban-American family. The film will tell the story of a father coming to grips with his daughter’s upcoming wedding through the prism of multiple relationships within a big, sprawling Cuban-American family. Also singer-songwriter Gloria Estefan will also star in the movie. (Deadline)

Additional cast members have been announced for the indie spy thriller Agent Game: Jason Isaacs (the Harry Potter franchise), Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips) and Adan Canto (Designated Survivor). The film also stars Dermot Mulroney, Katie Cassidy, Rhys Coiro, Annie Ilonzeh, and Mel Gibson. The film focuses on CIA officer Harris (Mulroney), who is involved in missions to detain and relocate foreign nationals for interrogation. When Harris’ superior (Isaacs) is murdered, he finds himself the scapegoat for the killing of a detainee (Abdi) and must run from a team of operatives sent to bring him in (Canto, Cassidy, Coiro), led by a ruthless double agent (Ilonzeh). Gibson will play a rogue intelligence official running the off-book operation to hunt down and kill Harris. (Deadline)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hi All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWAL

Netflix has given Bridgerton the green light for seasons 3 and season 4 well ahead of the season 2 premiere. (TV Line)

The Cinemax drama Warrior has been renewed for a third season with the show moving over to HBO Max. (Variety)

CBS has renewed Bull, S.W.A.T., Blue Bloods, Magnum P.I. and NCIS. It should be noted that Mark Harmon will actually be back for the show’s 19th season, but it hasn’t been determined how many episodes will include him. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Robert Buckley (iZombie) has joined the ensemble cast of the Hallmark Channel series Chesapeake Shores. His casting follows the announcement that series regular Jesse Metcalfe will be leaving the series at the end of the upcoming season. (Deadline)

The Netflix holiday franchise movie Princess Switch 3, which stars High School Musical alum Vanessa Hudgens in the lead roles, has added Will Kemp, Amanda Donohue and Remy Hii to the cast. Kemp will play Hunter Cunard, a suave and sophisticated international hotelier, with a particular interest in acquiring valuable antiques and rare artifacts. Details on who Donohue and Hii have yet to be announced. The “threequel” plot line is: When a priceless relic is stolen, Queen Margaret and Princess Stacy enlist the help of Margaret’s audacious look-alike cousin Fiona (all played by Hudgens) again who teams with a dashing, mysterious man from her past to retrieve it, rekindling the sparks of a tantalizing Christmas romance and resulting in a very unexpected switch. (Deadline)

Gabriel Luna (Terminator: Dark Fate and Matador) has joined the cast of the HBO series adaptation of The Last of Us that is based on the video game that will star Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey as Joel and Ellie respectively. Luna will star as Tommy, Joel’s younger brother, a former soldier who hasn’t lost his sense of idealism and hope for a better world. The series takes place twenty years after modern civilization has been destroyed. Joel, a hardened survivor, is hired to smuggle Ellie out of an oppressive quarantine zone. What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal, heartbreaking journey, as they both must traverse across the U.S. and depend on each other for survival. (Variety)

Italia Ricci (Designated Survivor and Chasing Life) will star in the 10-episode Netflix sci-fi drama The Imperfects that revolves around three twenty-somethings who, following an experimental gene therapy, are turned into monsters who band together to hunt down the scientist responsible and force him to make them human again. Ricci will star as Dr. Sydney Burke, a brilliant scientist looking to fix her past mistakes, both professional and ethical, by allying with Abbi, Juan and Tilda to track down the scientist responsible for their grim fates. (The Hollywood Reporter)

New Amsterdam fans are probably wondering what really happened with Dr. Vijay Kapoor (series regular Anupam Kher) after Tuesday night’s episode. It was announced that Kher is leaving the show due to a real life medical issue: his wife – actress Kirron Kher – has been diagnosed with a type of blood cancer. (Deadline)

Oscar Nunez (The Office) will appear in multiple episodes of Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist as Dr. Tesoro, Zoey’s therapist who is a warm yet slightly sarcastic man who will help Zoey navigate her grief, powers and relationships. And for once, Zoey is able to tell someone about her special abilities without any consequences. (TV Line)

Benedict Cumberbatch (Dr. Strange and Sherlock) will star in the limited series The 39 Steps from Netflix that is based on the classic thriller novel by John Buchan. The series is a provocative, action-packed conspiracy thriller series that updates the classic novel for relevance in contemporary times. An ordinary man, Richard Hannay, becomes an unwitting pawn in a vast, global conspiracy to reset the world order: 39 Steps that will change the world as we know it, with only Hannay standing in the way. (Deadline and The Futon Critic)

Jordan Belfi (Moonlight, Entourage and All American) will recur in Good Girls, playing Z, who is part of the multi-level marketing group Dean (Matthew Lillard) gets involved with to help him find a way out of his dire situation with his wife Beth (Christina Hendricks). (Deadline)

Regina Taylor (I’ll Fly Away) will appear in the upcoming Showtime anthology series The First Lady, playing Michelle Obama’s mother. Young actress Saniyya Sidney (Fences) will play Sasha Obama and newcomer Julian De Niro as young Barack Obama. The series already stars Viola Davis as Michelle Obama, Michelle Pfeiffer as Betty Ford and Gillian Anderson as Eleanor Roosevelt. (Deadline)

Young actresses Mckenna Grace (Designed Survivor) and Lexi Underwood (Little Fires Everywhere) will star in the Disney+ supernatural anthology series Just Beyond, which is based on the bestselling BOOM! Studios graphic novel from Goosebumps author R.L. Stine. The 8-episode series will tell astonishing and thought-provoking stories of a reality just beyond the one we know. Each episode introduces viewers to a new cast of characters who must go on a surprising journey of self-discovery in a supernatural world of witches, aliens, ghosts and parallel universes. Grace and Underwood will lead their respective-stand-alone episode. (Deadline)

Carlos Gomez (The Glades and The Baker and the Beauty) and Anja Savcic (Loudermilk) have landed recurring roles on the new ABC drama Big Sky. Gomez will play Gil Amaya, the former ranch manager who is forever entangled with the Kleinsasser family, including their darkest secrets while Savic is set to play Scarlet Leyendecker, the loving, protective mother of ten-year-old daughter, Phoebe, who will be played by Zoe Noelle Baker (The Haunting of Bly Manor). (Deadline)

Jane Seymour (Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman) will star in the 8-episode Irish mystery thriller Harry Wild that will air on Acorn TV. The series will be set in Dublin with Seymour playing Harriet Wild, a recently retired English professor who cannot help but take an active interest in the criminal cases assigned to her police detective son, Charlie. The series will premiere in 2022 on Acorn TV in the U.S., Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. (Deadline)

Common (Hell on Wheels) will appear in the second season of the Netflix series Never Have I Ever, set to premiere in July, in the recurring role of Dr. Chris Jackson, a suave and debonair dermatologist who works in Nalini’s (Poorna Jagannathan) building. His high-end practice and celebrity clients are impressive to everyone except Nalini. (Deadline)

BOX OFFICE CASTING NEWS

Natalie Portman will appear in the upcoming HBO Film The Days of Abandonment, which is based on the Elena Ferrante novel. The film follows what happens when Tess (Portman), a woman who abandoned her own dreams for a stable home life, is in turn abandoned by her husband, and her world is thrown off its axis. (Variety)

Lucy Liu will appear in the sequel film Shazam! Fury of the Gods, playing the villain Kalypso, the sister of villain Hespera, who will be played by Helen Mirren. Zachary Levi will return as Shazam with Asher Angel back as the teenage alter ego Billy Baston. (Variety)

Hugh Jackman and Laura Dern will star in the box office movie The Son from writer-director Florian Zeller, which is an adaptation of Zeller’s acclaimed stage play. Jackman will play Peter, who has a busy life with his new partner Emma and their baby. Their lives are thrown into disarray when his ex-wife Kate (Dern) turns up with their teenage son, Nicholas, who is troubled, distant, and angry, playing truant from school for months – both Kate and Nicholas need Peter’s help. Nicholas’s wish is to live with his father for a change. Peter strives to be a better father, searching to help his son with those intimate and instinctive moments of family happiness – to solve, with understanding, what Nicholas is going through. But the weight of Nicholas’ condition sets the family on a dangerous course. They must do everything they can to maintain the bonds that hold them together. (Variety)

Guy Pearce and Monica Bellucci will star opposite Liam Neeson in the box office movie Memory, a crime thriller based on the book De Zaak Alzheimer by Jef Geeraerts as well as the Belgian film The Memory of a Killer. The follows Alex Lewis (Neeson), an expert assassin with a reputation for discreet precision. When Alex refuses to complete a job for a dangerous criminal organization, he becomes a target and must go on the hunt for those who want him dead. Veteran FBI agents Vincent Serra (Pearce), Linda Amistead and Mexican intelligence liaison Hugo Marquez are brought in to investigate the trail of bodies, leading them closer to Alex, but also drawing the ire of local tech mogul Davana Sealman (Bellucci). With the crime syndicate and FBI in hot pursuit, Alex has the skills to stay ahead, except for one thing: he is struggling with severe memory loss, affecting his every move. As details blur and enemies close in, Alex must question his every action, and who he can ultimately trust. (Deadline)

Mads Mikkelsen (Hannibal) will star alongside Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones 5. Plot details have not been announced nor are their details on what part Mikkelsen will play. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

CANCELLATION

The season finale of MacGyver set to air on April 30 will actually be the shows’ series finale, as CBS has pulled the plug on the reboot after five seasons. (TV Line)

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Plans are still in the works for another NCIS spin-off: this one called NCIS: Hawaii; and sources confirm that this version will feature a woman – tentatively named Jane Tennant – in the starring role. (TV Line)

The long-gestating revival of Nash Bridges is set to go into production in May as a 2-hour movie with the hopes of that movie serving as backdoor pilot for a full series relaunch with series star Don Johnson returning. It’s believed that series regular Cheech Marin and Jeff Perry will reprise their roles along with at least 6 new characters. (TV Line)

TV CASTING NEWS

Actress Adepero Oduye (The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) will appear in the Apple TV+ limited series Five Days at Memorial, playing Karen Wynn, the nurse manager of the intensive care unit at Memorial Hospital and the head of its ethics committee. (The Hollywood Reporter and The Futon Critic)

Robyn Lively (from the iconic 80’s film Teen Witch and half-sister to Blake Lively) will appear as Sara Bellum in the upcoming live-action pilot of Powerpuff for The CW. Based on the original Powerpuff Girls cartoon, fans of the franchise will recall Miss Bellum was the Mayor’s right-hand woman, though we never truly got to see her face. This version of the character is a warm and witty career woman who has a complicated romantic history with Professor Utonium, who will be played by Donald Faison. (Deadline and TV Line)

Eli Goree (The 100 and One Night in Miami) will star opposite Chloe Grace Moretz and Jack Reynor in the Amazon sci-fi thriller drama The Peripheral that will be based on the best-selling novel by Willam Gibson. The book centers on Flynne (Moretz) and her brother Burton (Reynor). Burton, a veteran of the United States Marine Corps’ elite Haptic Recon force, is hired for a security job which takes place in what he thinks is cyberspace. When Flynne temporarily takes his place, she witnesses something that might have been murder. Goree will play the character of Conner. (Deadline)

Patricia Hodge (A Very English Scandal) will take over the role of Mrs. Pumphrey in the second season of the PBS drama All Creatures Great and Small from the late, great Diana Rigg. (Deadline)

The lead cast for the CBC (the Canadian network) and BET+ drama The Porter has been announced. First, the series is about a group of 1920s railway workers who unite to form the world’s first Black union. Cast members include: Aml Ameen (I May Destroy You and the box office film Yardie) will play Junior Massey, an intelligent, smooth, ambitious, and fearless risk-taker and war veteran employed as a porter with the transcontinental railroad; Ronnie Rowe Jr. (Star Trek: Discovery) will play Massey’s war buddy Zeke Garrett; and Mouna Traoré (The Umbrella Academy) will play Massey’s wife Marlene, a worker with the Black Cross Nurses, an offshoot of Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association. (Deadline)

It’s been confirmed that Tatiana Maslany will not be returning to play Sister Alice in the upcoming second season of Perry Mason on HBO.  (This announcement makes sense given that Maslany will be the lead in the Disney+ series She Hulk.) (TV Line)

Game of Thrones alum Nikolaj Coster-Waldau will star in and executive produce a series adaptation of the Christina Clancy novel The Second Home that follows the Gordon and Shaw families beyond a fateful summer on Cape Cod. Told through two generations, the story explores how a devastating secret can derail young love, tear apart families, and change the fate of countless individuals forever if they let it. No network or writer is currently attached to the series. (Variety)

Hamilton alum and Tony winner Renee Elise Goldsberry is expected to join the cast of She-Hulk at Disney+, joining Orphan Black lead Tatiana Maslany, who will play the title role. The series will center on lawyer Jennifer Walters (Maslany), cousin of Bruce Banner, who inherits his Hulk powers after she receives a blood transfusion from him. Unlike Bruce, however, when she hulks out Jennifer is able to retain most of her personality, intelligence, and emotional control. Details on the character Goldsberry would play are being kept under wraps, though. (Variety)

Multi-hyphenate Wayne Brady will appear in The Good Fight, playing a new love interest for a Reddick/Lockhart staffer (but we don’t know which one). He will have the recurring role of Del Cooper, a comedian-turned-executive at a top streaming service who intersects romantically and professionally with the lawyers at the firm. (TV Line)

Jodie Turner-Smith (Queen & Slim and The Last Ship and recently married Dawson’s Creek alum Joshua Jackson) has exited the Witcher prequel series The Witcher: Blood Origin where she was set to play the warrior Elie, one of the leads in the six-episode limited series. (Variety)

Spider-Man Tom Holland will star in the 10-episode, anthology series The Crowded Room that has been ordered at Apple. The first season of the series will be based on the biography “The Minds of Billy Milligan” by Daniel Keyes, telling the story of Billy Milligan (Holland), the first person ever acquitted of a crime because of Multiple Personality Disorder (now known as Dissociative Identity Disorder). (Variety)

Bridgerton Season 2 at Netflix is officially adding four new cast members. Newcomer Charithra Chandran play Edwina Sharma, who has been taught by her older sister Kate to be the perfect debutante. She’s kind-natured and endlessly endearing. But while she may be young and naive, she also knows what she wants: a true love match. Shelley Conn (Terra Nova, The Liar and The Lottery) will play Lady Mary Sharma, whose marriage once embroiled her and her family in scandal; but now newly returned to London with her daughters, she’s forced to endure the scrutiny of the ton yet again. Calam Lynch (2020’s Black Beauty and Mrs. Wilson) will play Theo Sharpe, a hardworking printer’s assistant. And, Merlin alum Rupert Young will play Jack, the newest member of the ton with a connection to one of its most notable families. (Variety)

Robert I. Mesa has been promoted to a recurring role in Grey’s Anatomy where he was introduced as intern James Chee, the first indigenous doctor on the long-running medical series.
(Variety)

BOX OFFICE CASTING NEWS

Letitia Wright (Black Panther) and Tamara Lawrence (The Long Song) will star in the feature film Silent Twins, playing the title twin sisters in the haunting true story of June and Jennifer Gibbons, twins from the only Black family in a small town in Wales in the 1970s and ’80s. Feeling isolated from that unwelcoming community, the pair turn inward and reject communication with everyone but each other, retreating into their own fantasy world of artistic inspiration and adolescent desires. After a spree of vandalism inspired by an American boy they both idolize, the girls, now teenagers, are summarily sentenced to Broadmoor, the infamous UK psychiatric hospital, where they face the choice to separate and survive or die together. (Deadline)

Phoebe Waller-Bridge has joined the cast of the upcoming Indiana Jones 5 film that will find Harrison Ford returning in the title role. (Variety)

Helen Mirren, who won an Oscar for “The Queen,” will portray Israel’s legendary Prime Minister Golda Meir in “Golda.” The movie focuses on the intensely dramatic and high-stakes responsibilities and decisions that Meir, also known as the “Iron Lady of Israel,” faced during the Yom Kippur War. On Oct. 6, 1973, under cover of darkness, on Israel’s holiest day and during the month of Ramadan, the combined forces of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan begin a surprise attack on the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. Outnumbered and outgunned, Meir confronts the immediate, clear, and present danger of a ticking time-bomb that she hoped never to face. Surrounded, isolated, and frustrated by the infighting of her all-male cabinet, with little hope of rescue, one woman is in a race against time to save millions of lives on both sides of the conflict. (Variety)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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Hey All,

Here are the news items for this past week:

RENEWALS/CANCELLATIONS

There will be no 4th season for American Gods as Starz has pulled the plug on the series. (TV Line)

Miss Scarlet and the Duke has been given a second season renewal. (Masterpiece)

Disney+ has decided not to order a 2nd season of The Right Stuff, but Warner Bros. Television (the studio behind the series) is shopping the series to other outlets. (Deadline)

TV DEVELOPMENT NEWS

CBS has given CSI: Vegas, the reboot/revival of the original series CBS, a formal series order. The series will pick up six years after the original finale, finding vets Gil (William Petersen) and Sara (Jorja Fox) surrounded by a new crop of Sin City-based CSIs who will be played by Matt Lauria (Friday Night Lights and Kingdom), Paula Newsome (Chicago Med and NCIS), Mel Rodriguez (Last Man on Earth) and Mandeep Dhillon (After Life). Wallace Langham, who played lab tech David Hodges, will also be back as a series regular. (TV Line)

NBC has given a series order to the drama Ordinary Joe that will explore the three parallel lives of the show’s main character to be played by James Wolk (Tell Me A Story) after he makes a pivotal choice at a crossroads in his life. The series asks the question of how different life might look if you made your decision based on love, loyalty or passion. The series also stars Natalie Martinez (Under the Dome and The Fugitive), Charlie Barnett (Arrow and You) and Elizabeth Lail (Once Upon a Time and Dead of Summer). (Variety)

TV CASTING NEWS

Breakout star Rege-Jean Page will not appear in season 2 of Bridgerton, but fans of the hit Netflix streaming series shouldn’t be upset, as season 2 will focus on Anthony Bridgerton’s quest to find a wife (as the 2nd season is based on the 2nd book in the Julia Quinn book franchise) and the fact that Page’s appearance was only set for the debut season. (Variety)

Dan Stevens (Downton Abbey and Legion) will replace Armie Hammer in the upcoming Starz drama series Gaslit that is set to star Julia Roberts and Sean Penn. The series is a modern take on Watergate, focusing on the untold stories and forgotten characters of the scandal — from Nixon’s bumbling, opportunistic subordinates, to the deranged zealots aiding and abetting their crimes, to the tragic whistleblowers who would eventually bring the whole rotten enterprise crashing down. Stevens will play John Dean, the young White House Counsel torn between his ambition and his struggle with whether he can lie to protect the President. (TV Line)

Jesse Metcalfe will be leaving the Hallmark Channel series Chesapeake Shores during its upcoming 5th season. (TV Line)

Colin Firth will play Michael Peterson in a series adaptation of The Staircase, which has been ordered to series at HBO Max. The series is based on the docuseries of the same name focusing on Peterson, who was accused of murdering his wife, Kathleen, in 2001. He claimed she died after falling down the stairs at their home, but police suspected he bludgeoned her to death and staged the scene to look like an accident. (Variety)

Jason Dohring (Veronica Mars, Moonlight and iZombie) has landed a recurring role in SEAL Team where he will play LCDR Whitshaw, a charismatic and intelligent, high ranking officer with a stellar reputation, who knows how to work the regulation and system to his advantage. He has a cunning ability to cover his own tracks, which makes him a formidable adversary. (Deadline)

Amanda Seyfried will take over the role of Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos, from Kate McKinnon who exited the project. The series will tell the story of Holmes, the enigmatic Stanford dropout who founded medical testing start-up Theranos. She was lauded as a Steve Jobs for the next tech generation. Once worth billions of dollars, the myth crumbled when it was revealed that none of the tech actually worked, putting thousands of people’s health in grave danger. Holmes’ scam was so successful, that Theranos was at one time valued at nine-billion dollars, making her one of the richest women in the world. She was indicted by a federal jury in 2018, along with the former Theranos chief operating officer, on nine counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Also, Naveen Andrews (Lost) will play Sunny Balwani, Holmes’ business partner and secret boyfriend throughout the rise and fall of Theranos. He served as the president and chief operating officer of the company. (Variety)

To All the Boys 2 star Jordan Fisher will have a recurring role in The Flash, playing Bart Allen, the fastest teenager on the planet and the future son of Barry (series lead Grant Gustin) and Iris (series regular Candice Patton). (TV Line)

The upcoming Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi has added a number of cast members, including Moses Ingram (The Queen’s Gambit), Joel Edgerton (Red Sparrow), Kumail Nanjiani (The Lovebirds and Big Sick), Indira Varma (For Life and Game of Thrones), Rupert Friend (Homeland), O’Shea Jackson Jr. (Straight Outta Compton), Sung Kang (Power and the Fast & Furious franchise) and Simone Kessell (Terra Nova) [among others]. Details on what roles each will play are being kept under wraps. (Variety)

Jack Reynor (Strange Angel) has joined the cast of the upcoming Amazon series adaptation of the novel The Peripheral by author Willaim Gibson. He joins Chloe Grace Moretz and Gary Carr (The Deuce and 21 Bridges), who will play the characters Flynne and Wilf respectively. Reynor will play Burton, Flynne’s brother and a US Marine Corp veteran who served in the Haptic Recon unit. (Variety)

BOX OFFICE CASTING NEWS

Russell Crowe will appear in a small but undisclosed role in Thor: Love and Thunder that finds Chris Hemsworth back as Thor, Natalie Portman back as Jane Foster (who will become a Thor) and Tessa Thompson back as Valkyrie. Christian Bale will play villain Gorr the God Butcher while Chris Pratt and other members of the Guardians of the Galaxy will also appear. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Jeremy Strong (Succession) will play Jonas Salk, the inventor of the polio vaccine, in the upcoming film Splendid Solution based on the best-selling novel, which follows Dr. Salk on his quest to find a cure for the deadly virus. (Variety)

New cast members for the upcoming box office film Being the Ricardos, that will star Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem as Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, have been announced, including Tony Hale (Arrested Development and Veep), Alia Shawkat (Search Party), and Jake Lacy (High Fidelity). Hale will play I Love Lucy executive producer and head writer Jess Oppenheimer, while Shawkat and Lacy will play the show’s longtime writing partners, Madelyn Pugh and Bob Carroll Jr. Other cast members include Clark Gregg (Avengers franchise and Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) and veteran actors John Rubinstein, Linda Lavin, Robert Pine in as-yet announced roles. (The Hollywood Reporter)

That’s it. Enjoy!

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