The Weekly Round-Up for June 13 to 17

Here are the entertainment news items for this past week:

NEWS

Actor Blair Underwood (The Event) will make his Broadway debut as Stanley Kowalski in the upcoming revival of A Streetcar Named Desire. There is no word yet on who will be joining him as twisted sisters Blanche or Stella.

TELEVISION NEWS

AMC has renewed The Killing for a second season.

It looks like the three men behind Glee (Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan) are finally getting some help. They have hired some new staff, who will hopefully allow the show to return to a more creative completeness. The new staff includes Allison Adler (Chuck and No Ordinary Family) who will be a co-executive producer, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (the Spiderman: Turn Off the Dark musical) as co-producer, Marti Noxon (Buffy and Angel veteran ) and Michael Hitchcock will both be consulting producers and Matt Hodgson and Ross Maxwell as staff writers.

AMC has set a premiere date for the second season of The Walking Dead on October 21.

While Doctor Who will be back for a new season with 14 episodes, a full season of the show will not be aired in 2012, but rather “a special run for the anniversary in 2013.”

DEVELOPMENT NEWS

Caroline Dhavernas (Off the Map and Wonderfalls) has landed the female lead in the USA pilot called Over/Under, which centers on Paul (Steven Pasquale), a day trader with a massive gambling problem who is fired from his job six months after a bad trade costs his firm millions. Shut out of the job market, he and his wife (Dhavernas) — a professional photographer specializing in nude portraits and a devoted Manhattanite — move to Brooklyn. There, Paul finds an unlikely partner, expectant father Marino (Anthony Carrigan), to start a high-end bookie business.

Young actress Bailee Madison (Just Go With It) has joined the FX drama pilot called Powers that is based on the graphic novel by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming. The pilot is a police procedural set in a world where superpowers are relatively common and centers on two detectives, Christian Walker and Deena Pilgrim, in a Homicide department that deals with cases involving “powers” (people with superpowers). The 11-year-old will play Calista, an otherworldly young girl raised by her stepdad Eagle, a man with powers. When Eagle’s wife is murdered and he goes on the lam, Calista comes to stay with Walker and develops a bond with him.

It looks like the USA Network is finalizing a deal to pick-up the new comedic buddy cop drama called Common Law, which stars Michael Ealy and Warren Kole. The series is to center on polar-opposite LAPD homicide detectives Travis Marks (Ealy) and Wes Mitchell (Kole), whose nonstop bickering and acrimony prompts their no-nonsense captain Phil Sutton (Jack McGee) to send them to a couples therapist. The role of the therapist, played in the pilot by Amy Acker, will be recast, along with another, smaller part.

Broadway actors John Gallagher Jr. (Spring Awakening) and Thomas Sadoski (Reasons To Be Pretty) have joined the Aaron Sorkin HBO drama pilot called More As This Story Develops. Meanwhile, actor Josh Pence (who will be seen in the upcoming films Battleship and The Dark Knight Rises) has been tapped to join the cast as well. The pilot centers on cable news anchor Will McCallister (Jeff Daniels) and his show’s staff led by executive producer Mackenzie (Emily Mortimer). Gallagher will play Jim, who was offered another job when Mackenzie’s show was cancelled but turned it down to come work with her on Will’s show — where he develops a crush on associate producer Maggie (Alison Pill); Pence will play Rob, a senior producer who has been in a relationship with Maggie for five months and starts to become jealous of her budding romance with Jim and Sadoski will play Will’s former executive producer who left him to go work for Will’s protégé’s new show.

Actor Mark Ruffalo is confirmed and actress Zoe Saldana is negotiating to appear in the upcoming martial drama film called Infinitely Polar Bear. The story follows a bipolar husband and father (Ruffalo) who goes off his medication, and then loses both his sanity and job while struggling to hold onto his marriage. Saldana would play his wife, who, after going back to work, ends up moving out of the house, leaving him alone with the kids.

MADE FOR TV MOVIE NEWS

Actor Rob Lowe (Parks and Recreation) and actress Kaley Cuoco (The Big Bang Theory) will appear in the Lifetime movie, tentatively titled he movie, tentatively titled The Drew Peterson Story aka Ladykiller. Lowe will play the lead role, Drew Peterson, who was charged with the death of his third wife after the mysterious disappearance of his fourth wife. Cuoco will appear as the fourth wife.

Actress Laura Prepon (That 70’s Show) and country singer Naomi Judd will star in the Lifetime TV movie called The Killing Game, based on the best-seller by Iris Johansen. Prepon will play Eve Duncan, the popular heroine of the thriller, who 10 years after the disappearance and murder of her 7-year-old daughter Bonnie, is contacted by a man claiming to be her killer. Taunted by his clues about Bonnie’s case and his threats to kill again, she throws herself into her career as a forensic sculptor and works to close the case. Naomi Judd will co-star as Eve’s mother, Sandra Duncan.

CONDOLENCES

Laura Ziskin, Spider-Man franchise producer and co-founder of Stand Up to Cancer (SU2C), lost her battle with breast cancer Sunday night. She was 61.

ME: Rest in Peace, Ms. Ziskin. Deepest condolences to her family, friends and fans.

MOMENT OF SILENCE, PLEASE…

CASTING SCOOP

Actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Undercovers) has landed the female lead opposite Kiefer Sutherland in the FOX drama pilot Touch, which is considered a lock for a midseason series order. The series centers on Martin (Sutherland) who discovers that his genius son Jake (David Mazouz) is communicating with him through a complex series of numbers and may even be able to predict events before they happen.

Actor Curtis Armstrong (Revenge of the Nerds and Moonlighting) has landed a multi-episode arc on The Closer, playing Peter Goldman, a resourceful attorney hired by the mother of a slain gang member to sue Brenda Leigh Johnson (Kyra Sedgwick) and the Los Angeles Police Department.

Actress Abigail Spencer (Mad Men) will guest star on the new USA Network series Suits that debuts on June 29. She will appear as a high-powered attorney who goes toe-to-toe with Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht). Being onetime Harvard classmates, sparks may fly outside the courtroom as well for the opposing counsels.

Tony nominated actress Elizabeth Rodriguez has joined the cast of the new NBC drama series Prime Suspect that stars Maria Bello as Jane Timoney, a female detective working in a tough, male-dominated precinct in New York City. Rodriguez will play another detective on the force.
The new show will air on Thursday nights at 10 PM.

Actor Gilles Marini (Brothers & Sisters) has been cast on the new ABC Family Channel series Switched at Birth. He will appear as the birth father of Bay (Vanessa Marano).

Oscar-winning actress Patty Duke is joining the new Lifetime drama The Protector as the mother of mother of Ally Walker’s character – homicide detective Gloria Sheppard.

Actor James Frain (The Cape and True Blood) will guest star in an upcoming episode of Burn Notice, which returns for a new season on June 23. Frain will play the powerful owner of a pharmaceutical company responsible for several medical breakthroughs who runs his business with extreme security, and is willing to go to great lengths to protect its secrets.

Actors Kyle Howard (My Boys) and Wilmer Valderrama (That 70’s Show) will be showing up on episodes of Royal Pains, which returns for a new season starting on June 29. Howard will appear in multiple episodes playing Paul Van Dyke, a cocky doctor with whom Divya (Reshma Shetty) must contend once she begins her new (secret) job at Hamptons Heritage. Meanwhile, Valderrama will also have a multi-episode arc playing Eric, an art gallery owner who takes a liking to Paige’s (Brooke D’Orsay) work and quite possibly more.

NOTE: The weekly calendar and the box office news will appear separately this week.