Clare-Hope Ashitey (“Suspects,” “Children of Men”) has been added to the cast of Veena Sud’s upcoming Netflix series, “Seven Seconds.” The Hollywood Reporter writes that the British actress will be the “leading lady” in “The Killing” creator’s next show.
“Seven Seconds” depicts the growing tension “between African-American citizens and Caucasian police officers in Jersey City, where a teenage African-American boy is critically injured by a cop,” THR reports.
Ashitey will portray K.J. Harper, an assistant prosecutor in New Jersey involved in the controversial case. Previously announced cast members include Regina King (“American Crime”), David Lyons (“The Cape”), and Michael Mosley (“Castle”).
The first season of the crime drama will feature 10 episodes, and Sud will serve as showrunner.
Back in February it was reported that Sud is scripting Broad Green Pictures’ remake of German thriller “We Monsters.” The original film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2015 and tells the story of a young girl who, unhinged by her parents’ separation, commits an unthinkable crime — which her mother and father then take it upon themselves to conceal.
Sud has spoken about her skill for writing morally ambiguous and conflicted characters — a talent that she’ll no doubt rely on to pen “Seven Seconds” and “We Monsters.” “The beauty of the anti-hero… is that we as human beings know so many people like that,” she said. “We’re one of those people ourselves in real life. We are full of brokenness, we’re full of character defects, we’re full of pride and pomposity. We make horrible mistakes, and we betray people we love. We do all that, but at the heart of maybe each and every one of us is the desire to do good and a desire to live a meaningful life,” Sud observed. “Either a Pollyanna character or an evil character could be one-dimensional. But if you set out from the beginning to just sketch a portrait of a human being that you’ve met in life, or a composite of a human being, inevitably you will get that multi-dimensional aspect that all of us can relate to and not box them into just good/bad.”