Today, Showtime announced the pilot order for the new half-hour comedy series BALL STREET, starring Emmy® nominated and Golden Globe winning actor Don Cheadle (HOUSE OF LIES) and two-time Tony® Award nominee and Grammy winner Andrew Rannells (Girls, The Intern). Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg will direct and executive produce the pilot. BALL STREET was created by David Caspe (Happy Endings) and Jordan Cahan (My Best Friend's Girl), who will serve as executive producers and showrunners. Production on the pilot is scheduled to begin in February. The project is a co-production between Showtime and Sony Pictures Television Studios. The announcement was made today by David Nevins, President and CEO, Showtime Networks Inc.
BALL STREET takes us back to October 19, 1987 - aka Black Monday - the worst stock market crash in the history of Wall Street. To this day, no one knows who caused it. Until now... BALL STREET is the story of how a group of
OUTSIDERS took on the blue-blood, old-boys club of Wall Street and ended up crashing the world's largest financial system, a Lamborghini limousine,
Don Henley's birthday party, and the glass ceiling.
"When the global economy incinerates itself, people always wonder why. BALL STREET is a dream project rising from the ashes of that disaster," Nevins said. "In
Don Cheadle and
Andrew Rannells, we have two of the most dynamic performers in the world today - the question is which one of them lit the match. With Seth, Evan, David and Jordan at the helm, we are primed for the launch of something memorable."
Cheadle returns to
Showtime in the role of Rod "The Jammer" Jaminski, a self-educated, self-made, self-destructive master of the universe whose firm the financial press called, "The L.A. Raiders of corporate raiders." Rannells plays Blair Shmerman, a fresh-out-of-Wharton trading prodigy whose pure heart will struggle to survive Wall Street (from both a metaphoric and cocaine standpoint). Jammer's top lieutenant, Dawn Darcy, has yet to be cast. Darcy is the first female head trader on the street, who'll ride the second wave of feminism through a sea of horny millionaires.
Cheadle won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for four consecutive Primetime Emmy Awards as Outstanding Lead Actor for his performance on the
Showtime series HOUSE OF LIES, giving him eight Emmy nominations in his career. He has been nominated for five Golden Globes, also winning for his supporting role in The Rat Pack. He received an Academy Award® nomination for Best Actor in Hotel Rwanda. He has also received four individual Screen Actors Guild® Award nominations and twice won in the ensembles of Crash and Traffic. Most recently Cheadle starred as
MiLes Davis in Miles Ahead which he directed, co-wrote and produced and for which he won a Grammy® Award. Among his many memorable performances are Avengers, Talk to Me, Ocean's Eleven, Out of Sight and Boogie Nights.
An accomplished actor of the stage and screen, Rannells appeared in a series regular role on Girls. His additional television credits include The New Normal, The Knick,
ANOTHER PERIOD and How I Met Your Mother. His film credits include The Intern opposite
Robert De Niro and
Anne Hathaway, and the upcoming
Paul Feig feature A Simple Favor. Rannells has starred in a number of major Broadway productions including The Book of Mormon and Falsettos (both of which earned him Tony Award nominations), Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Jersey Boys, Hairspray and the smash hit Hamilton. He also won a Grammy Award for the original Book of Mormon cast recording.
Rogen and Goldberg co-created and executive produce the television drama Preacher, directing the pilot and several episodes, and have written and produced such films as Superbad and Pineapple Express. They were nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for their work on Da Ali G Show and Film
INDEPENDENT SPIRIT AWARDS for 50/50.
Caspe created and executive produced Happy Endings, as well as Marry Me, on which Cahan was supervising producer. Cahan also wrote My Best Friend's Girl, starring
Kate Hudson.
Showtime Networks Inc. (SNI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of
CBS Corporation, owns and operates the premium television networks SHOWTIME®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ and FLIX®, and also offers
Showtime ON DEMAND®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ ON DEMAND and FLIX ON DEMAND®, and the network's authentication service
Showtime ANYTIME®.
Showtime Digital Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of SNI, operates the stand-alone streaming service SHOWTIME®.
Showtime is currently available to subscribers via cable, DBS and telco providers, and as a stand-alone streaming service through Apple®, Roku®, Amazon, Google, Xbox One and Samsung. Consumers can also subscribe to
Showtime via Hulu,
Youtube TV, Sling TV, Sony PlayStationâ„¢ Vue and Amazon Channels. SNI also manages Smithsonian Networksâ„¢, a joint venture between SNI and the Smithsonian Institution, which offers Smithsonian Channelâ„¢, and offers Smithsonian Earthâ„¢ through SN Digital LLC. SNI markets and distributes sports and entertainment events for exhibition to subscribers on a
Pay-Per-View basis through
Showtime PPV. For more information, go to www.SHO.com.
Images courtesy of Showtime
