Pilots and Casting: Who Got Good News Last Week

LL Cool J
Michael Yarish/CBS
LL Cool J

It’s pilot season, which means television news has been bursting at the seams with announcements in addition to all of the regular news items that TV garners each week. We’ve gathered together all of the pilot pickups and recent casting news from this past week, from NBC’s nine (!) pilot orders to CBS’s new Supergirl.

Shows That Got the Green Light

Flaked
With The Millers over and done, Will Arnett is prepping for a future at Netflix. He was behind their recent animated comedy BoJack Horseman, which was renewed for a second season after only being out for a few days, and has now landed a new series, Flaked, which has been given an eight-episode direct-to-series order. Arnett will star and executive produce in the show as a self-proclaimed “guru” set in Venice, Calif. Mitch Hurwitz (Arrested Development) will also executive produce. The series is set for a 2016 premiere.

Frankenstein
Fox ordered this sci-fi drama centering on corrupt cop Ray Pritchard, who is given a second chance when he is brought back from the dead.

Luther
Fox is also moving forward with a remake of the popular BBC series; the American version is being executive produced by its counterpart’s star, Idris Elba.

Rosewood
A procedural in the same vein as Bones, executive produced by Todd Harthan (Psych) and directed by Richard Shepard (Ringer) gets an order from Fox.

48 Hours ‘Til Monday
Also for Fox is this comedy from The Mindy Project’s Charlie Grandy about a man desperately trying to save time during weekends.

People Are Talking
A multi-camera comedy about a black and white couple from Growing Up Fisher’s DJ Nash gets the nod from NBC.

Take It From Us
Another for NBC, this love story told in flashbacks to ’90s New York isn’t a new How I Met Your Mother, but it is from Mother’s executive producer Greg Malins and is told by both parents to their son and his fiancée, so we already know how it turns out.

Game Of Silence
On the drama side, NBC ordered this pilot based on the Turkish drama Suskunlar about an attorney with a violent past that is dangerous to his future plans.

Blindspot
The drama pilot written by L.A. Complex creator Martin Gero that centers around a woman with no memories who is found naked in Times Square with a vast amount of mysterious tattoos that may be her only clue to unlocking who she is, also won NBC’s attention.

Unveiled
Mark Burnett and Roma Downey (Also responsible for the upcoming miniseries A.D.) won an order from NBC for this biblical pilot about flawed guardian angels.

Heart Matters
The medical soap about a female heart transplant surgeon based off of Dr. Kathy Magliato’s 2011 book Heart Matters: A Memoir of a Female Heart Surgeon also got NBC’s approval.

Endgame
One more for NBC, this thriller from TNT’s The Librarians creator John Rogers, centers on a sniper turned security expert in Las Vegas.

Life in Pieces
CBS has given a pilot order to Better Off Ted alum Justin Adler’s Modern Family-like single camera comedy told through the perspective of each of the family members.

Runner
This hour-long ABC drama follows a woman living a perfectly fine life who finds she must take part in arms dealing to uncover an important truth. John Cowan (Private Practice) will serve as showrunner.

Of Kings And Prophets
ABC is getting biblical with this drama pilot from Exodus: Gods and Kings writers Adam Cooper and Bill Collage that is told from the perspectives of a tired king, a resentful prophet, and a young shepherd.

Quantico
Taking place in Quantico, Va., this hour-long drama also picked up by ABC follows a group of young FBI recruits in training with flashbacks that reveal their deadly pasts. It’s written by Josh Safran (Gossip Girl).

LA Crime
This true crime story won ABC’s attention. The show will focus on a different era in Los Angeles each season, with season one taking on the hard rock, drug-addled 80s.

Mix
The one-hour dramedy executive produced by Rashida Jones (Parks & Recreation) and Will McCormack (In Plain Sight) focuses on a family restaurant business at a crossroads.

Untitled projects
NBC ordered an untitled single-camera comedy pilot starring John Stamos (whose ABC series set for earlier this season got axed before airing) and an untitled hour-long dramedy from Grey’s Anatomy’s former executive producer Krista Vernoff and John Wells.

Actors With Something to Celebrate

Melissa Benoist
The Glee actress has been cast in CBS’s highly anticipated Supergirl pilot in the lead role.

Rob Lowe
The Parks and Recreation alum and current DirecTV commercial star has landed a role in Sky’s upcoming Apocalypse Slough, a British series taking place west of London in the town of Slough where an eccentric group of people prepare for the end of the world by bunkering underground as a comet prepares to wipe out the planet. Lowe will be playing Father Jude, who holds the position of Devil’s Advocate at the Vatican. The series will air on NBC in the United States, and also stars Jenna Fischer (The Office), and Will & Grace alum Megan Mullally.

LL Cool J
The NCIS: Los Angeles star will be returning to host the 57th Grammy Awards on CBS for the fourth year in a row.

Ian McShane
The Deadwood alum will be joining Season 3 of Showtime’s Ray Donovan in a season-long arc as Malcolm Finney, a billionaire producer who befriends Liev Schreiber’s “fixer.”

John Leguizamo
The actor landed the starring role in Taxi-22, the late James Gandolfini’s comedy project for CBS about a New York City taxi cab driver.

Ron White, Jacqueline Byers, and Branscombe Richmond
Showtime’s one-hour comedy pilot Roadies has added three members White (Reno 911!), Byers (Ascension), and Richmond (Renegade) join Christina Hendricks and Luke Wilson in the Cameron Crowe and J.J. Abrams series about a rock tour seen through the eyes of its crew.

Kerry Condon and Toby Leonard Moore
The two have been cast opposite the previously announced Paul Giamatti and Damian Lewis in Showtime’s finance drama Billions. Moore will also appear in Netflix’s upcoming Daredevil.

Nadia Hilker and Amber Clayton
Hilker (The Other Wife) and Clayton (Three Rivers) have been cast as the female leads in TNT’s drama pilot Breed about a mysterious set of murders in the Pacific Northwest.

Orla Brady
The Fringe actress is joining AMC’s direct-to-series Badlands in the lead role. The martial arts-themed drama is loosely based on Chinese tale Journey to the West.