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Lex Luthor or Daddy Warbucks? That is the question in the first promo for NBC’s Annie Live! musical event (airing Thursday, Dec. 2 at 8/7c).
The above video offers a glimpse at the cast in character, with newcomer Celina Smith as Annie, Taraji P. Henson as Miss Hannigan and a very different-looking Harry Connick, Jr. as Lex Daddy Warbucks. The ensemble also features Nicole Scherzinger (Grace), Tituss Burgess (Rooster Hannigan) and Jane Krakowski (Lily St. Regis).
NBC’s previous live musical productions include 2013’s The Sound of Music Live!, 2014’s Peter Pan Live!, 2015’s The Wiz Live!, 2016’s Hairspray Live! and 2018’s Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert. In 2020, the network aired Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch Musical, a prerecorded stage show headlined by Matthew Morrison.
Ready for more of today’s newsy nuggets? Well…
* B Positive has tapped D.B. Sweeney (Two and a Half Men) to recur during Season 2 as a cook who works at the Valley Hills assisted living facility, under new boss Gina, our sister site Deadline reports.
* Marion Cotillard, Eiza Gonzalez, Tobey Maguire and Forest Whitaker have joined Apple TV+’s climate change-themed anthology Extrapolations, from writer/director Scott Z. Burns (Contagion).
* FX has given a pilot order to the comedy Belated, written and directed by Rescue Me co-creator Peter Tolan, our sister site Variety reports. The project follows “an unexpected intergenerational friendship between Owen, a recently out man in his 40s, and Clay, a 17-year-old trans teen, as Owen and his ex-wife and children attempt to find their new normal.”
* Netflix has released a trailer for Masters of the Universe: Revelation Part 2, premiering Tuesday, Nov. 23. New voice cast additions include Method Man (as Clamp Champ), Dee Bradley Baker (as Savage He-Man) and Danny Trejo (as Ram Man).
* Paramount+ has released the full trailer for The Real World Homecoming: Los Angeles, a docuseries which reunites most of the 1993 MTV reality show’s cast members in their original house on Venice Beach. The first episode drops on Wednesday, Nov. 24.
Which of today’s TVLine Items pique your interest?
I was too young for Real World LA, but I’ve been watching older seasons of the Challenge. I loveeeeee Beth. I’m excited to see her in this.
Can’t wait to check out the iconic Real World reunion. Looking forward to catching up with Tami and her castmates on my Paramount+ soon!
Annie is a Red head, white girl… They already tried black annie and it was an mayor flop
Why are they replacing all the red heads?!
Honestly, i’m not sure if it’s racism or just laziness, it seems to me in an effort to be more Diverse, Hollywood is casting Black people into the roles of white characters instead of creating something/someone new with their own identity and history. They could have just named her Annie in honor of the the original and created a whole new story and songs but they just took the lazy way out. This kind of hidden racism always get a pass
Bingo!
BOOM!! I don’t knock Judy Garland I go enjoy my favorite very talented cast of The Wiz!! Wokeness is starting to ruin so many shows now! Yes I’m tired of the Netflix light skinned mediocre actress with a very talented dark male but geesh hire talent to be woke!! Too many Annie reboots!
I really hope you’re not Black because using the whitewashed “wokeness” bs is disheartening. Not sure when “woke” was change to mean however it is confusingly used today. Since the 40s Black people used it in greetings to each other for us to pay attention to what is going on around us. Not about cancel culture or making anything more diverse. And DEF not a put down.
Thank you. I’m so frustrated when people use the word “woke” and have no idea what it really means. Someone hear black people use the word, never through to even ask what it means just believed they knew and here we are. As for Annie being red haired and white, Annie is a fictional character, meaning she never existed, she can be anything and look any way the writer makes her.
Annie is fictional. Thus she is whatever the writers make her.
It looks like they took inspiration from Different Strokes for this version.
Seriously cant wait for the next drop of Master of the Universe Revelations Episodes.
Nostalgia in overdrive
So excited to watch this new version of Annie. Love Harry Connick Jr. and little Celina Smith is absolutely adorable! The rest of the cast is also top notch!
Not long ago, there was panic in the streets when Emma Stone portrayed a Hawaiian lady. And that movie vanished. But changing Lttle Orphan Annie is acceptable? I don’t get it.
Thumbs down.
Just a matter of time before they make a black Alice in Wonderland, Rapunzel or Snow white [no pun intended].
There is a black Rapunzel in a commercial airing now. An d did you not watch ‘Once upon a time’?
Honestly, I think we are making a tempest in teapot here. When they cast the actress playing Annie, I was a little disappointed that they didn’t go with a traditional redhead. But at the end of the day, we want the actress to be awesome and kill it. I think the story works no matter who you cast.
I’m sorry but that pic, I seriously didn’t recognize Harry Connick Jr. I thought it was a light-skinned black actor whom I didn’t know.
Wait for it, coming soon: Geppetto carved Pinocchio out of ebony wood.!