Elizabeth Banks Joins Cast of MRS. AMERICA on FX

Three-time Emmy Award® nominee, producer, director and writer Elizabeth Banks has joined the extraordinary cast for Mrs. America, a nine-episode limited series that will premiere on FX in 2020.

Banks will play Jill Ruckelshaus. A pro-choice, socially progressive Republican, Ruckelshaus was appointed by President Ford to advance women's rights, and fought to keep the Republican Party from being taken over by Phyllis Schlafly and the Religious Right.

Banks joins a cast that features Cate Blanchett, Uzo Aduba, Rose Byrne, Kayli Carter, Ari Graynor, Melanie Lynskey, James Marsden, Margo Martindale, Sarah Paulson, John Slattery, Jeanne Tripplehorn and Tracey Ullman in Mrs. America.

Banks is an acclaimed and award-winning actor whose credits include the Pitch Perfect franchise, The Hunger Games franchise, Love and Mercy, W, Seabiscuit, Wet Hot American Summer, Definitely Maybe, The 40 Year Old Virgin, Catch Me If You Can, Spiderman, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Modern Family (nominated for 2 Emmy Awards), and 30 Rock (nominated for an Emmy award). She will next be seen starring as a 'Bosley' in the highly anticipated Charlie's Angels film, which she also produced, directed, and wrote.

Mrs. America tells the story of the movement to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), and the unexpected backlash led by a conservative woman named Phyllis Schlafly, played by Blanchett. Through the eyes of the women of that era - both Schlafly and second wave feminists Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Shirley Chisholm, Bella Abzug and Jill Ruckelshaus - the series explores how one of the toughest battlegrounds in the culture wars of the 70s helped give rise to the Moral Majority and forever shifted our political landscape.

Mrs. America is written by Emmy® Award winning writer Dahvi Waller (Mad Men) and Executive Produced by two-time Academy Award® nominee Stacey Sher, Waller, Coco Francini, Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck, and Blanchett, with Micah Schraft and James Skotchdopole serving as Co-Executive Producers. The limited series is produced by FX Productions, with Waller serving as Showrunner. Boden & Fleck, who most recently co-wrote and directed the blockbuster feature Captain Marvel, will direct the first two episodes of Mrs. America. Mrs. America marks the first series regular role in an American television program for Blanchett, a two-time Academy Award and Golden Globe® Award winner.

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