The Casting Call 03.09.09

The Casting Call brings together the latest casting news to keep you informed on who is showing up on which show. Find out who is joining your favorite show as a series regular, a recurring character, a guest star or special cameo. The Casting Call could reveal upcoming story-lines, so be aware, there may be spoilers ahead.

Cop House (Fox)
Tony Hale is set to star in Fox’s comedy Cop House. The show is set at a halfway house for troubled cops. Hale, who co-starred on Fox’s comedy pilot Boldly Going Nowhere and recurs on Chuck, will play a cop who suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Empire State (ABC)
Tammy Blanchard and Mel Raido have joined ABC’s drama Empire State. The contemporary Romeo and Juliet story is about a blue-collar man falling in love with a wealthy girl. Blanchard will play the man’s cousin and close friend, a successful attorney. Raido will play the girl’s ruthless and manipulating brother.

Limelight (ABC)
Robbie Jones and Shannon Woodward have been added to ABC’s drama Limelight. The show set at a performing-arts college, Jones, and Woodward will play an inspired percussionist and a talented actress, respectively, who audition for the academy.

Maggie Hill (Fox)
Luke Mably, Gbenga Akinnagbe and Anna Rose Hopkins have joined Fox’s drama Maggie Hill. The show about a brilliant surgeon with schizophrenia (Christina Cole), Mably will play her boyfriend, a handsome doctor. Akinnagbe will play Maggie’s rival, an arrogant surgeon. Hopkins will play Maggie’s younger sister.

Melrose Place (The CW)
Ashlee Simpson-Wentz has been cast as a lead on the CW’s Melrose Place update. Simpson-Wentz will play Melrose Place’s newest resident, Violet, a bright-eyed but shrewd small-town girl and recent L.A. transplant who has come to town with a secret. Her character draws parallels to the original series’ blond, budding-Southern-belle starlet, Sandy Harling (Amy Locane). Simpson-Wentz joins the previously cast Michael Rady and Katie Cassidy.

Miami Trauma (CBS)
Lana Parrilla has been cast in CBS’ drama Miami Trauma. Jerry Bruckheimer’s Miami Trauma is an ensemble action medical show set in a Miami trauma center. In it, Parrilla will play a brilliant surgeon who becomes the leader of the trauma team.

No Heroics (ABC)
Eliza Coupe has been tapped for a lead in ABC’s comedy No Heroics. The show revolves around four B-list superheroes living among us. Coupe will play one of them, a bad girl who can turn invisible.

Three Rivers (CBS)
Justina Machado has been cast in CBS’ drama Three Rivers. On the show about doctors performing transplants, Machado will play an operating assistant.

V (ABC)
Morena Baccarin will play a lead in the ABC drama V. The show is a re-imagining of the 1980s miniseries about an invasion of aliens known as Visitors and the resistance against them. Baccarin will play Anna, the leader of the Visitors who is remarkably knowledgeable about human culture and media manipulation.

Vampire Diares (The CW)
Nina Dobrev has landed the lead in the CW’s drama pilot Vampire Diaries. Based on Alloy’s novels, Vampire Diaries centers on Elena (Dobrev), a tragic heroine who is the object of passion for two vampire brothers. She is repped by Innovative.

Untitled Jerry Bruckheimer Pilot (ABC)
Rupert Penry-Jones has been cast as the lead in ABC’s untitled Jerry Bruckheimer drama pilot. The untitled Bruckheimer project is a mystery series about a group of amateur detectives led by a former cop (Penry-Jones), whose 11-year-old daughter was kidnapped three years ago with no leads.