TAGGED AS: AMC, news, PBS, streaming, television, TV
Jessica Jones star Krysten Ritter is taking on Orphan Black: Echoes. Kate Winslet will star in another HBO series — her fourth. Author Christopher Paolini’s The Inheritance Cycle four-book series will become a Disney+ series. Plus, trailers for A League of Their Own and Let the Right One In film-to-TV adaptations, and more of the biggest news in TV and streaming of the past week.
(Photo by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)
She was Jesse Pinkman’s love in Breaking Bad, super-strong Marvel superhero Jessica Jones, and the B in Apt. 23, and now Krysten Ritter is making a return to AMC as the star and executive producer of the Orphan Black follow-up series Orphan Black: Echoes.
The new series, a follow-up to the 2013-17 BBC America sci-fi thriller that starred Tatiana Maslany and future Better Call Saul star Michael Mando, is set in the near future, and takes a deep dive into the exploration of the scientific manipulation of human existence.
Echoes follows a group of women as they weave their way into each other’s lives and embark on a thrilling journey, unravelling the mystery of their identity and uncovering a wrenching story of love and betrayal. Ritter will play Lucy, a woman with an unimaginable origin story, trying to find her place in the world.
Echoes was picked up for a 10-episode first season earlier this year and is expected to debut in 2023.
(Photo by Matt Squire/Playground Television (UK))
The third season of the warm and cuddly British period drama All Creatures Great and Small will premiere at 9 p.m., January 8 on PBS Masterpiece, it was announced Thursday as part of the channel’s second of two days of panels at the Television Critics Association all-virtual summer press tour. The World War II–era series is based on the loosely autobiographical books written by Alf Wight under the pen name of James Herriot and tells of his adventures as a veterinary surgeon in the Yorkshire Dales.
While promoting the new season, the cast did promise that more animals will be in store — “I’ve got a new pet,” boasted Samuel West, who plays the veterinary surgeon and mentor to Nicholas Ralph’s Herriot, although he couldn’t elaborate further — and that the show will tackle serious issues like tuberculosis.
On a lighter note, executive producer Colin Callender confirmed that there will be another holiday episode this season.
“We’re not going to let you down on this one,” he said. Rachel Shenton, who plays James’ love interest Helen Alderson, chimed in that “Father Christmas is good this year.”
There will also be some great (presumably human) guest stars this season, although the cast and producers couldn’t elaborate as to who they might be or who they’d be playing.
(Photo by Nick Wall/Eleventh Hour Films)
More from the PBS presentation at TCA:
• PBS Masterpiece will debut Anthony Horowitz’s television adaptation of his crime novel Magpie Murders at 9 p.m., October 16. Lesley Manville stars as a book editor-turned-amateur investigator whom she told TCA “doesn’t have to explain herself,” enjoys putting men in their places, and who is “absolutely not conforming to anything.”
The veteran actress added that the character is further proof that “you can still be exciting after 50.”
• PBS Masterpiece is working with Maven Screen Media and others to develop the five-part series currently titled Mrs. Churchill (as in Clementine, wife of Winston). Boardwalk Empire writer Margaret Nagle is working on the script.
• Taking a page from the Bridgerton playbook, PBS Masterpiece and others are developing a four-part miniseries adaptation of The History of Tom Jones complete with color-blind casting. Solly McLeod and Sophie Wilde star.
• PBS Masterpiece’s Miss Scarlet And The Duke has been renewed for a third season, which will air at 8 p.m., January 8.
• On October 4 and 11 respectively, directors Stanley Nelson and Nicole London will premiere the PBS documentaries Harriet Tubman: Visions of Freedom and Becoming Frederick Douglass.
• Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s latest PBS series, Making Black America: Through the Grapevine, will premiere in four parts starting October 4. Working with directors and producers Shayla Harris and Stacey L. Holman, it looks at the history of social networks and organizations by — and for — Black people that were beyond the reach of the “white gaze” (think the establishment of Prince Hall Masons in 1775, historically Black towns and business districts, HBCUs and even Black Twitter).
• The latest season of Gates’ PBS program Finding Your Roots will feature actors Joe Manganiello and Tamera Mowry-Housley and will premiere January 3.
• The three-part documentary-series The U.S. and the Holocaust from Ken Burns, Lynn Novick and Sarah Botstein will premiere September 18 on PBS. Working with The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million author Daniel Mendelsohn and other activists, it seeks the dispel the myth that Americans were the liberators and, in fact, show our culpability in the rise of anti-semitism both in Europe and at home — a problem that still persists today.
• The four-part documentary Fight The Power: How Hip Hop Changed The World from Public Enemy’s Chuck D and producing partner Lorrie Boula, will premiere in January on PBS. Featuring commentary from will.i.am, Run-DMC, Ice-T, and more, it traces 40 years of hip hop and how the genre shaped America and the rest of the world.
“I wasn’t surprised that rap took America by storm,” Chuck D said at TCA. “I wasn’t really surprised that hip hop and rap music and the terms [that] are defined very clearly in this series took hold on the rest of the world. It opened up a Pandora’s box of a light that was kind of shunned to the side when we had limited media. And when the music and the media and technologies opened up more, it allowed for the detail to be issued. And now we’re at a point, in the 21st century going into the third decade, where a series like this could speak to so many out there.” –WF
A League of Their Own is the series adaptation of the beloved 1992 baseball movie, with new characters and their unique journeys shown through a fresh reimagining of the story. Stars Abbi Jacobson, Chanté Adams, D’Arcy Carden, Gbemisola Ikumelo, Roberta Colindrez, Nick Offerman, and Dale Dickey. Premieres Aug. 12. (Prime Video)
More trailers and teasers released this week:
• In Locke & Key season 3, the family uncovers more magic within Keyhouse, while a new threat — the most dangerous one yet — looms in Matheson with plans of his own for the keys. Stars Darby Stanchfield, Connor Jessup, Emilia Jones, Jackson Robert Scott, Kevin Durand, Sherri Saum, Brendan Hines, and Coby Bird. Premieres Aug. 10. (Netflix)
• Pinocchio is Oscar winner Guillermo del Toro stop-motion reinvention of Carlo Collodi’s classic tale of the wooden marionette who is magically brought to life in order to mend the heart of a grieving woodcarver named Geppetto. Stars Gregory Mann, Ewan McGregor, Tilda Swinton, Christoph Waltz, Finn Wolfhard, Cate Blanchett, John Turturro, Ron Perlman, and Tim Blake Nelson. Premieres in December. (Netflix)
• Blonde reimagines the personal and professional lives of Marilyn Monroe, based on the bestselling novel of Joyce Carol Oates. Stars Ana de Armas, Adrien Brody, Bobby Cannavale, and Julianne Nicholson. Premieres Sept. 28. (Netflix)
• In Power Book III: Raising Kanan season 2, Raquel ‘Raq’ Thomas has gained control over the city’s drug trade, but her son is slipping away. Kanan Stark returns to Queens uncertain of his future with the family business, and because of Detective Howard’s lingering secret, he’s even more uncertain of his past. Kanan searches for the truth while Raq boldly expands the business into hostile Mafia territory. Stars MeKai Curtis and Patina Miller. Premieres Aug. 14. (Starz)
• Running with the Devil is a documentary about John McAfee, inventor of one of the most successful (and most hated) pieces of software of all time: McAfee Anti-Virus. At his peak, McAfee was worth $100 million. But when his neighbor was murdered, McAfee went on the run — and invited a film crew with him. With access to hundreds of hours of never-before-broadcast footage of McAfee as he’s pursued by the authorities, this is the definitive story of a larger-than-life character, a man who ran for President, escaped from prison multiple times, and claimed to have hacked the world. Premieres Aug. 24. (Netflix)
• Me Time is a comedy movie about a stay-at-home dad (Kevin Hart) who finds himself with some “me time” for the first time in years. While his wife and kids are away, he reconnects with his former best friend (Mark Wahlberg) for a wild weekend that nearly upends his life. Also stars Regina Hall and Jimmy O. Yang. Premieres Aug. 26. (Netflix)
• The Undeclared War is the six-part cyber-drama series that tracks a leading team of analysts buried in the heart of GCHQ, secretly working to ward off a series of cyber-attacks on the UK in the run up to a general election. When a routine stress test of internet infrastructure goes awry 21-year-old GCHQ intern Saara Parvan (played by Hannah Khalique-Brown) suddenly finds herself operating on the invisible frontier of high-stakes cyber warfare. Also stars Mark Rylance and Simon Pegg. Premieres Aug. 18. (Peacock)
• Let the Right One In is the 10-episode thriller that centers on Mark (Demián Bichir) and his daughter Eleanor (Madison Taylor Baez), whose lives were changed 10 years earlier when she was turned into a vampire. Locked in at age 12, perhaps forever, Eleanor lives a closed-in life, able to go out only at night, while her father does his best to provide her with the human blood she needs to stay alive. Also stars Anika Noni Rose, Nick Stahl, and Grace Gummer. Premieres Oct. 9. (Showtime)
• Never Have I Ever – in season 3 of the coming-of-age comedy, teenager Devi (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) continues to deal with the everyday pressures of high school and drama at home, while also navigating new romantic relationships. Also stars Darren Barnet, Poorna Jagannathan, and Niecy Nash. Premieres Aug. 12. (Netflix)
• Echoes is a mystery thriller about two identical twins, Leni and Gina, who share a dangerous secret. Since they were children, Leni and Gina have secretly swapped lives, culminating in a double life as adults: they share two homes, two husbands, and a child, but everything in their perfectly choreographed world is thrown into disarray when one of the sisters goes missing. Stars Michelle Monaghan, Matt Bomer, and Daniel Sunjata. Premieres Aug. 19. (Netflix)
• The Princess is an intensely emotional and immersive look at the life of Princess Diana, including the relationship of Diana and Charles, the Prince of Wales, tabloid fodder for nearly two decades, the subject of almost daily headlines in the 24-hour news cycle. The documentary draws solely from contemporaneous archival audio and video footage to take audiences back to key events in Diana’s life as they happened, including their seemingly fairy-tale public courtship and wedding, the birth of their two sons, their bitter divorce, and Diana’s tragic and untimely death on August 31, 1997. Premieres Aug. 13. (HBO)
• Bad Sisters is a dark comedy murder mystery about the tight-knit Garvey sisters, who have always looked out for each other. When their brother-in-law winds up dead, his life insurers launch an investigation to prove malicious intent—and set their sights on the sisters, all of whom had ample reason to kill him. Stars series creator Sharon Horgan, Anne-Marie Duff, Eva Birthistle, Sarah Greene, Eve Hewson, Claes Bang, and Brian Gleeson, Premieres Aug, 19. (Apple TV+)
• The New York Times Presents Superspreader is the next entry in FX’s documentary series, this one about vaccines – how effective they are and how they are often the subject of misinformation being spread to the public. On that front, researchers blame people like Dr. Joseph Mercola, an osteopathic physician in Florida who has long been a subject of criticism and government regulatory actions for his promotion of unproven or unapproved treatments. More recently, he has become a leading spreader of Coronavirus misinformation online, according to researchers, building a vast operation to push natural health cures and disseminate anti-vaccination content — while reaping immense profits. Premieres Aug. 19. (FX)
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(Photo by John Phillips/Getty Images For L'Oréal Paris)
Multiple Emmy winner Kate Winslet will star in her fourth HBO limited series, The Palace, which unfolds a year within the walls of the palace of an authoritarian regime as it begins to unravel. Winslet, who won Emmys for 2011’s Mildred Pierce and 2021’s Mare of Easttown, and last month was announced as the star of another miniseries, The Trust, based on the Hernan Diaz novel of the same name, will also executive produce The Palace. The Palace will be directed by Stephen Frears (The Queen, A Very English Scandal) and written by Will Tracy (Succession), who will also serve as executive producers.
Also on tap at HBO: the true crime limited series My Dentist’s Murder Trial, starring and executive produced by Stranger Things star David Harbour and The Mandalorian and The Last of Us star Pedro Pascal. The series is inspired by James Lasdun’s 2017 New Yorker article of the same name, about Dr. Gilberto Nunez, Lasdun’s dentist, who was accused of killing his friend Thomas Kolman after having an affair with Kolman’s wife. Pascal will play Nunez, but Deadline reports HBO will not confirm who Harbour will portray in the project.
Oscar nominee Margot Robbie is set to appear on the series finale of the Australian soap opera Neighbours, on which she starred in her pre-fame days. Fellow celebs who also made early career appearances on the soap, including Kylie Minogue, Natalie Imbruglia, and Guy Pearce, will also guest star on the finale, which airs on July 29 in the U.K. on Channel 5.
Sarah Paulson will star in and executive produce the Hulu horror thriller Dust, about a mother who is trapped in intense dust storms she has to protect her family from. (THR)
Variety reports Donald Trump’s White House Director of Strategic Communications Alyssa Farah Griffin is in final talks with ABC to join The View as the host panel’s conservative co-host, and would join the daytime talk show full-time in September. (Variety)
Once Upon a Time star Adelaide Kane will join the upcoming 19th season of Grey’s Anatomy playing a new surgical resident named Jules Millin, who was raised by “drug-addled artist/hippies” who mostly raised herself. (TVLine)
Another new Grey’s Anatomy cast member: Harry Schumm Jr., the Glee alum who will play another new resident, Daniel “Blue” Kwan, who Deadline describes as “sharp-witted, impatient and brilliant … generous by nature but competitive to a fault, naturally gifted, and used to winning at everything,” (Deadline)
Hulu has placed a straight-to-order series for La Máquina, a Spanish-language limited series following an aging boxer (Gael García Bernal) whose crafty manager (Diego Luna) secures him one last shot at a title. But to make it to fight night, they must navigate a mysterious underworld force. Bernal and Luna will also produce the drama, while Marco Ramirez (Daredevil) will serve as showrunner, and Gabriel Ripstein (600 Miles) will direct.
David Krumholtz has joined the cast of Disney+’s The Santa Clause spin-off, reprising his role as beloved Bernard the head elf. Tim Allen and Elizabeth Mitchell return as Mr. and Mrs. Clause for the series. (Deadline)
It’s official: Mayim Bialik and Ken Jennings will share duties as the permanent hosts of Jeopardy!, as announced by new showrunner and executive producer Michael Davies.
(Photo by Penguin Random House)
The Inheritance Cycle, Christopher Paolini’s four-book YA fantasy series about a boy and his dragon that kicked off with Eragon, is in development as a live-action series at Disney+, Paolini confirmed on his official site. “This has been a long time coming. I can’t tell you how many conversations, meetings, and messages were needed in order to reach this point. And we’re still just at the beginning!…Disney will have more to say on this adaptation in the near future, but in the meantime, I wanted to confirm the news and to reassure you that I’m committed to making sure that this version of Eragon’s story lives up to your highest expectations.” Paolini will serve as co-writer and producer on the drama. The series, which began as self-published in 2002, was then picked up by Knopf in 2003, and has since sold more than 41 million copies globally. The series was adapted into a 2006 feature film starring Ed Speleers and Jeremy Irons that was not well received by critics, posting a Tomatometer score of only 16%.
Bryan Cranston, who still has that Better Call Saul guest appearance coming up before the Breaking Bad prequel airs its Aug. 15 series finale, has signed a TV production deal with Steve Mosko and his Village Roadshow. Mosko was previously head of Sony Picture Television and largely oversaw the development of Breaking Bad during his time at SPT. Cranston, via his Moonshot Entertainment, will create and develop projects for various platform. (THR)
Adult Swim announced Sept. 4 as the premiere date for Rick and Morty Season 6. The animated comedy, recently nominated for its third Emmy, has been viewed more than 10 billion times globally, across linear, digital, and streaming since its 2013 debut.
HBO Max launched a “House of the Dragon: DracARys” free augmented reality game app that gives fans the chance to hatch and raise their own virtual reality drama. The app can be downloaded via Apple and Google Play.
Disney+ has announced its first original U.K. series, Wedding Season, to premiere on Sept. 8. The romantic comedy/action thriller, which will stream on Hulu in America, revolves around Katie (Alita: Battle Angel star Rosa Salazar) and Stefan (Vikings: Valhalla’s Gavin Drea), who meet at a wedding and begin an affair, despite the fact that Katie is engaged to someone else. When she gets married a couple of months later, her new husband and his family are murdered, and Stefan is accused of the crime. (Variety)
The NFL isn’t going to let everyone else rake in those streaming dollars; the league is launching NFL+, with two tiers of subscriptions for football fans. The first tier costs $4.99 per month ($39.99/year), and the premium tier is $9.99 per month ($79.99 per year), and offerings include live local and national primetime games on mobile devices and full game replays and coaches films, depending on which level of subscription. The first game available on the subscription will be the Hall of Fame Game between the Jacksonville Jaguars and Las Vegas Raiders on Aug. 4.
Patton Oswalt will make his directorial debut with his upcoming Netflix special, We All Scream, on Sept. 20. It will be his fourth comedy special for the streaming network.
Netflix is developing its hit film The Gray Man as a spy franchise, with Ryan Gosling returning as star and Joe and Anthony Russo returning as directors for a sequel movie. The Gray Man co-writer Stephen McFeely will write the sequel, while writers Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese (Deadpool, Zombieland) will write a spin-off movie on a separate element of The Gray Man.
Legendary TV producer and comedy man Norman Lear, who turned 100 years old on July 27, will be the subject of ABC’s tribute special Norman Lear: 100 Years of Music and Laughter, which will air on Sept. 22. In the meantime, check out Deadline.com’s “Norman Lear At 100: His Legendary Life and Career in 100 Photos” retrospective of the Emmy winner’s spectacular career.
Peacock announced a straight-to-series order for ancient Rome gladiator epic drama Those About to Die, with Roland Emmerich (Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow) set to direct. The project is based on author Daniel Mannix’s book of the same name, and Robert Rodat (Saving Private Ryan) will write and executive produce the story, which takes on ancient Rome in a completely new way: epic in scope, with the spectacle of gladiators and chariot racing, and also unexpected characters amidst palace intrigue and a dark criminal underworld.
Nominations for MTV’s 2022 Video Music Awards, airing live from the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey on Aug. 28, are led by Kendrick Lamar, Lil Nas X, and Jack Harlow with seven each, followed by six each for Harry Styles and Doja Cat, and five each for the Weeknd, Drake, Dua Lipa, Ed Sheeran, Billie Eilish, and Taylor Swift. Madonna earned her 69th VMA nomination for “Madame X,” and becomes the only artist to be nominated in each of five separate decades. Fans can vote online for Video of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best New Artist, among other awards.
R&B Grammy winner and The Voice star Usher will executive produce Storyville, a drama series set in New Orleans during the birth of the Jazz Age. Variety reports Usher says the series is an “epic tale sparked by the origins of the sound the at inspired my career, a story that touches the nerve of social and cultural relevance today.” The story will follow five madams who are competing to control the red light district in The Big Easy with their brothels. Producers Starlings TV has not yet sold the series to a network or streaming service.
