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Credit: Denise Petski, Deadline, 7th July 2022
Marlee Matlin has tapped three Deaf actors, Stephanie Nogueras (Killing It), Joshua Castille and Lauren Ridloff (The Walking Dead, Eternals), to star in the episode she’s directing in the upcoming Fox anthology drama series Accused. Megan Boone also stars in her first major television role since The Blacklist, along with Aaron Ashmore (Locke & Key), Jean-Michele Le Gal (Take This Waltz) and Daphne Rubin-Vega (Allswell) in the series from Homeland EPs Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa, and David Shore (The Good Doctor, House). The episode is written by novelist and short-story writer Maile Meloy.
Nogueras stars in the lead role of Ava, a Deaf woman who becomes a surrogate for a couple, Jenny (Boone) and Max (Ashmore) and commits a crime of advocacy and protection.
Castille will play Ava’s boyfriend, KJ, who is hard of hearing. The episode also stars Le Gal and Ridloff as Ava’s public defenders and Rubin-Vega as Ava’s mother.
Developed by Gordon, Accused, co-produced by Fox Entertainment and Sony Pictures Television, is based on the BBC’s BAFTA-winning crime anthology. It opens in a courtroom on the accused, with viewers knowing nothing about their crime or how they ended up on trial. Told from the defendant’s point of view through flashbacks, Accused depicts how an ordinary person gets caught up in an extraordinary situation, ultimately revealing how one wrong turn leads to another, until it’s too late to turn back.
Accused, which received a straight-to-series order last May for the 2022-23 broadcast season, is co-produced by Sony Pictures Television and Fox Entertainment, and executive-produced by Gordon, Gansa, Shore, Glenn Geller, Erin Gunn, All3Media America’s Jacob Cohen-Holmes, and Jimmy McGovern, Sita Williams, Roxy Spencer and Louise Pedersen for All3Media International. Frank Siracusa and John Weber also serve as executive producers. Created by Jimmy McGovern, the original series debuted in 2010 on BBC One.
Nogueras is a Deaf actor who made her comedy debut in Killing It on Peacock. Her other recent TV credits include The Good Fight, Criminal Minds and The Magicians.
Boone has a deal at Sony Pictures Television, which produced The Blacklist and also produces Accused. She starred opposite James Spader on eight seasons of the NBC drama series. She also recenlty appeared in Barry Jenkins’ limited series Underground Railroad, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Colson Whitehead.
Castille is a Deaf performance artist who worked in venues ranging from small community theatres to Broadway and the Tony Awards stage. He has appeared in commercials, short films, music videos, and cameo appearances on TV shows and network programming.
Ashmore has had series lead roles in Netflix’s Locke & Key, Skymed, Killjoys and recently a recurring role in Netflix’s Ginny and Georgia. His other credits include the role of Jimmy Olsen in Smallville, along with appearances in Veronica Mars and CBS’ Ransom, among others.
Le Gal worked on Sarah Polley’s Take This Waltz opposite Michelle Williams and Seth Rogan, Anon opposite Clive Owen, and was a series regular on Nickelodeon’s Max & Shred. Le Gal appears in the upcoming Buzzfeed/Kionsgare feature 1UP and in the series La Petite Maraisse.
Ridloff played the lead in the Broadway revival of Children Of A Lesser God, for which she earned a Tony nomination. She went on to become a series regular on AMC’s The Walking Dead. She then became the first Deaf superhero opposite Angelina Jolie and Kumail Nanjani in Marvel’s Eternals. Ridloff received a 2020 BAFTA Breakthrough award recognizing the most promising stars of film and television.
Tony-nominated Rubin-Vega stars in and produced the independent feature Allswell, which just premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival. She was most recently seen starring as Daniela in the Jon Chu-directed Warner Brothers feature In The Heights. She recently wrapped production on two pilots – Hulu’s Olga Dies Dreaming and NBC’s Dangerous Moms. She is also voicing a role in the A24 animated series Hazbin Hotel.