We’re still in the thick of the current television season, but networks are gearing up for the 2015-16 season by packing their pilots with desirable names. During the last two weeks, there has been a ton of casting news announced for upcoming pilots, both broadcast and cable, comedy and drama. Here is a roundup of some of the most notable casting updates, from Fred Savage’s return to television to Jane Lynch’s post-Glee project to Eddie Izzard’s Salem witch trials role.
Mike Epps (Survivor’s Remorse) will play the titular character in ABC’s African-American reboot of Uncle Buck. Nia Long (currently on American Crime) will play his wife.
Dreama Walker and Elliott Gould (Don’t Trust The B in Apartment 23) were cast in CBS’ drama Doubt, alongside KaDee Strickland and Dule Hill. The series follow a successful lawyer (Strickland) who gets involved with one of her clients.
Dan Bakkedahl (Veep, The Mindy Project) will play Betsy Brandt’s husband in Life in Pieces, a CBS family sitcom.
Fred Savage has spent the last few years working as a director but will return to acting in The Grinder, Fox’s legal comedy, signing on to play Rob Lowe’s brother in the pilot.
On the drama side, Heather Graham joins Will McCormack in Fox’s Studio City, about a young singer living with her drug-dealing father.
Glee is ending this month but Jane Lynch already booked her next television project: a sarcastic guardian of angel in the CBS comedy Angel From Hell.
Wilmer Valderrama (That ’70s Show) signed on to Fox’s Minority Report pilot, an adaptation of the Steven Spielberg movie, as a police detective.
48 Hours ‘Til Monday, a Fox comedy about a husband/father, Charlie (Rob Riggle), struggling to have a good weekend (life is so hard!) cast Malcolm-Jamal Warner (The Cosby Show, Community) as a perfect father and Charlie’s nemesis, and Sarah Chalke (Scrubs) as Charlie’s wife.
Terry O’Quinn is still trying to break the Lost curse with a role in ABC’s The Adversaries as Charlie, a lawyer at a famous New York firm. Sounds riveting!
The always-wonderful Christopher Meloni booked a role in Underground, the straight-to-series WGN drama about the Underground Railroad. Meloni will play “a secretive mercenary who walks a tightrope between survival and morality.”
Giovanni Ribisi (Friends, Dads) nabbed the lead role in Sneaky Pete, the Bryan Cranston-produced and David Shore-created CBS comedy. Ribisi plays a con man who steals his cellmate’s identity after being released from jail. Margo Martindale also stars.
CBS’ Rush Hour reboot has also found its lead: Jon Foo (Tekken) will play the Jackie Chan role, Detective Lee. Rush Hour is still casting the Chris Tucker role.
Eddie Izzard will play a conservative Puritan farmer in the already highly anticipated Jenji Kohan drama about the Salem witch trials. The HBO series, tentatively titled The Devil You Know, will be directed by Gus Van Sant.