The return of Scandal tomorrow night after a three-month hiatus isn’t the only good news to come out of Shondaland.
Oscar-nominated actress Viola Davis (The Help, Prisoners) has signed on to star in Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers’ new legal thriller How to Get Away With Murder.
The Hollywood Reporter says of Davis’ character,
Annalise DeWitt [is a] law professor and renowned criminal defense attorney described as brilliant, passionate, creative, charismatic and ruthless in the courtroom and the classroom. The character is an excellent manipulator of people, particularly her law students — five of whom she selects to work with her at the firm. Married to a psychology professor and having an affair that no one can know about, she calls her Criminal Law 100 class “How to Get Away With Murder.”
It is worth noting that TV continues to be a more receptive place for women, including for older women and black women, than film, and we are glad that Davis will get to sink her teeth into something meaty. But, on the other hand, it is bad news for movie lovers when someone as important to the film world like Viola Davis is committing to a series. Knowing Rhimes’ body of work, How to Get Away will be exquisitely paced, deliciously soapy, and refreshingly diverse. Yet one never knows if the pilot will make it onto the schedule, but I won’t be complaining if we get to see Viola Davis on a weekly basis.
[h/t THR]
