Netflix Announces ‘Jupiter’s Legacy’ Premiere Date (TV News Roundup)
In today’s TV news roundup, Netflix announced the premiere date of “Jupiter’s Legacy,” and Showtime set the premiere date for Ziwe’s new variety show.
CASTING
Rebbi Rosie, Keiynan Lonsdale and Enrique Murciano have joined Starz‘ “Step Up” series, while Terayle Hill was promoted to series regular, reprising his role as Marquise in the upcoming season. The new cast members join Christina Milian and Ne-Yo in the series inspired by the “Step Up” Lionsgate film franchise. It centers around Ne-Yo as Sage Odom, the legendary founder of Atlanta’s famed High Water Performing Art School, whose legacy and ventures are threatened by a dark secret. Rosie plays Angel, a Brit who ditched the underworld of London’s organized crime families to prove she belongs among the world’s best dancers; Lonsdale takes over the role of Tal, originally played by Petrice Jones, the lead dancer for Sage’s billion-dollar tour, and Murciano plays Cruz, an ambitious lawyer carving his place among high profile, celebrity lawyers by defending Sage against a murder accusation.
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Rome Flynn, Aubriana Davis, Tracey Bonner and Josh Ventura have joined the cast of Netflix‘s “Raising Dion” for Season 2. Flynn will play the titular Dion’s (Ja’Siah Young) trainer and mentor Tevin Wakefield; Davis will be 15-year-old Janelle Carr, with Bonner playing her mother Simone Carr, and Ventura is David Marsh, the new vice president of operations for BIONA, the local biotech company featured in the show. Production of the eight episode second-season is currently underway in Atlanta, Ga. The series is based on the comic book by Dennis Liu and executive produced by showrunner Carol Barbee, Michael B. Jordan, Kenny Goodman, Liu, Michael Green, Darren Grant, Charles D. King, Poppy Hanks and Marta Fernandez.
DATES
Sundance Now’s “Secrets of a Psychopath” will be available on Sundance Now and AMC Plus on March 23. Over three installments and narrated through the first-hand accounts of experts, journalists and observers closest to the case, the true crime series unveils the most explosive and dramatic murder to come before the courts in Irish criminal history. It is produced by Peninsula Television.
The second season of Showtime’s “Couples Therapy” will premiere on April 18 at 10 p.m. Over nine episodes, Dr. Orna Guralnik offers an inside, visceral look at her weekly therapy sessions over the course of eight months. The new season presents three new couples and sheds light on the difficulties of at-home confinement as a result of the COVID-19 shutdown. It features a single mother’s unplanned pregnancy who must decide if the father is the man she wants to be with; a young gay couple grapples with the trauma and consequences of near-fatal alcoholism and a woman confronts her husband for failing to deliver the life she wants. Two episodes will release back-to-back each week on Sundays, with the finale airing May 16. The entire season will be available for streaming on-demand and across partner platforms on its premiere date. Watch a trailer below.
Showtime also shared that “Ziwe” will premiere on May 9 at 11 p.m. The new variety series, starring and executive produced by the titular comedian Ziwe, runs six episodes and features interviews, musical numbers, guest stars and sketches. It is produced by A24 and executive produced by Jamund Washington and Hunter Speese.
Netflix announced that “Murder Among the Mormons,” a three-part docuseries about the 1985 bombing in Salt Lake City that killed two people and severely injured another, sending shockwaves through the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, will premiere March 3. Ripples intensify when a number of early Mormon letters and diaries are found destroyed in the vehicle of the third victim, including the White Salamander Letter — an infamous artifact whose contents could threaten the foundations of Mormonism. “Murder Among the Mormons” is directed and executive produced by Jared Hess and Tyler Measom. The BBC Studios Production is also executive produced by Joe Berlinger and Ryan O’Dowd. Watch a trailer below.
Netflix also announced “Jupiter’s Legacy” will arrive on the streamer on May 7. Based on Mark Millar and Frank Quitely’s graphic novels, this epic superhero drama dives into the complex dynamics of family, power and loyalty as the next generation of superheroes rise up. It stars Josh Duhamel, Leslie Bibb, Ben Daniels, Elena Kampouris, Andrew Horton, Mike Wade and Matt Lanter. Mark Millar, Quitely, Lorenzo Di Bonaventura, Dan McDermott, Steven S. DeKnight, James Middleton and Sang Kyu Kim serve as executive producers. Watch a teaser below.
Epix will premiere the docuseries “Fall River” on May 16 at 10 p.m. Coming from Blumhouse Television and Pyramid Productions, it centers on the 1979 murders of three young women. Police alleged their deaths were at the hands of a satanic cult practicing human sacrifice. The cult leader, Carl Drew, was captured and sent to prison for life without parole. Twenty years later, lead investigator Paul Carey became consumed by the inconsistencies in the case and reinvestigated after retirement. “Fall River” jumps into the true story of a town gripped by 1980’s Satanic Panic and brings forth evidence that brings the case into question. Watch a teaser below.
FIRST LOOKS
Showtime released a trailer for the second season of “City on a Hill,” which premieres March 28 at 10 p.m. Season 2 finds hard-working coalition leader Grace Campbell (Pernell Walker) head-to-head with both local gang activity and FBI agent Jackie Rohr (Kevin Bacon), who is intent on exploiting Boston’s defective criminal justice system to save his own career. What’s more, assistant district attorney Decourcy Ward (Aldis Hodge) is onto Jackie’s schemes. Their personal antagonism escalates to a war between their respective offices and no one is safe from the collateral damage. The series also stars Lauren E. Banks, Mark O’Brien, Amanda Clayton, Matthew Del Negro, Jill Hennessy, Keiko Elizabeth, Lucia Ryan, Kameron Kierce, Shannon Wallace, John Doman and Michael O’Keefe. It is executive produced by Tom Fontana, Jennifer Todd, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Jorge Zamacona, Barry Levinson, Chuck MacLean and Michael Cuesta. Watch the trailer below.
TBS debuted the trailer for “Chad,” which premieres April 6 at 10:30 p.m. The show takes its own spin on the coming-of-age comedy, and features former “Saturday Night Live” cast member Nasim Pedrad as a 14-year-old pubescent Persian boy making his way through freshman year of high school. Pedrad also serves as the series’ creator, writer and showrunner. See the trailer below.
DEVELOPMENT
Mattel, Inc. and Nickelodeon will produce a new animated series and live-action television movie musical based on “Monster High,” the franchise about the children of famous monsters and creatures. It follows Clawdeen Wolf, Draculaura and Frankie Stein as they navigate the hilarity of high school at Monster High. The show and live-action musical is set to premiere in 2022 and will be available globally across Nickelodeon platforms. Production for the series is overseen by Claudia Spinelli and Shea Fontana, while Zack Olin and Shauna Phelan will lead the TV movie’s production.
EXECUTIVE NEWS
The Walt Disney Company appointed Susan Fox as senior vice president of government relations. She will lead Disney’s government relations team, which represents the company to members of Congress, the White House, regulatory agencies, opinion leaders and industry trade associations. Fox most recently served as the company’s vice president of government relations, representing Disney before the federal government and often focusing on policy issues that affect its traditional and media interests. On behalf of Disney, she sits on the boards of the National Association of Broadcasters, the Family Online Safety Institute and Digital Content Next.
Fox News Channel promoted Mike Emanuel to chief Washington correspondent and Jacqui Heinrich to congressional correspondent. Emanuel, who has been with Fox News for nearly 25 years, was most recently the network’s chief congressional and senior political correspondent. Heinrich served as a New York-based reporter since September 2018 and assumed the role of national correspondent for the 2020 election cycle.
AWARD SHOWS
TV5Monde USA and the Camden International Film Festival awarded the inaugural TV5Monde Maine Heritage Film Grant to Maine-based documentarians Daniel Quintanilla and Jessamine Irwin for “Le Carrefour.” The film tells the story of Tresor, who flees the unrest of the post-genocide Democratic Republic of Congo and seeks asylum in the United States, landing in Lewistone, Maine. He befriends Cecile, a retired Franco-American, and learns about the scars left by the KKK’s Protestant Nativist movement that targeted French immigrants.The grant, which awards Quintanilla and Irwin with $15,000 to producer their film and premiere at CIFF 2021, highlights Francophone culture in the state of Maine.
PODCASTS
QCode premiered “Unwanted,” a scripted comedy podcast series starring Lamorne Morris and Billy Magnussen. Created by Morris and comedian Kyle Shevrin, the eight-episode series follows two slackers trying to catch an escaped convicted murderer in order to obtain a million-dollar reward bounty. The first episode is now available, with episode two releasing Feb. 25 and new episodes rolling out each week.
LATE NIGHT
Tonight, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Soleil Moon Frye and Lord Huron will be on “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” and “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” will include Tom Holland, Andra Day and Mary McCartney. Colin Jost, Harvey Guillen and Raghav Mehrotra will be guests on “Late Night With Seth Meyers,” while “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” will have Billie Eilish, Anna Palmer and Jake Sherman on. Tracee Ellis Ross will be on “A Little Late With Lilly Singh.”
INITIATIVES
Ahead of its 17th season, the stars of “Deadliest Catch” shot a PSA to encourage the importance of wearing a mask amid COVID-19. It propels their message that being a ship captain means being prepared for just about anything, even a global pandemic. The PSA is a collaboration between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Discovery, with help from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Viewers can catch Captain Sig Hansen and Josh Harris when the spot airs on Discovery later this week. Watch a preview below.
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