James Marsden is one of 11 actors out to lead a “fellow juror” on the legal lark of his life in Jury Duty, a docu-style comedy series heading to Amazon’s Freevee this spring.
Premiering Friday, April 7 with its first four episodes (followed by two weekly drops of two episodes), Jury Duty aims to chronicle “the inner workings of an American jury trial through the eyes of one particular juror, Ronald Gladden,” a solar contractor from San Diego.
What Gladden doesn’t know is that the entire case being tried is fake… everyone except him — including onetime X-Man Marsden — is an actor… and everything that happens, inside the courtroom and out, is carefully planned. (Watch the first trailer above.)
Besides Marsden, who plays an “alternate version” of himself, the cast of jurors, court employees and judge include Alan Barinholtz (History of the World, Part II), Susan Berger (Brooklyn Nine-Nine), Cassandra Blair (Hacks), David Brown, Kirk Fox (Reservation Dogs), Ross Kimball, Pramode Kumar, Trisha LaFache, Mekki Leeper (The Sex Lives of College Girls), Brandon Loeser, Edy Modica (Made for Love), Rashida “Sheedz” Olayiwola (South Side), Kerry O’Neill (Murderville), Whitney Rice, Maria Russell, Ishmel Sahid, Ben Seaward, Ron Song and Evan Williams.
“Jury Duty originated with a question: Was it possible to make a sitcom like The Office about a trial, populate it with brilliant comedic performers, and put a real person at the center of the show who doesn’t realize he’s surrounded by actors?” executive producer Todd Schulman said in a statement. “We honestly had no idea, but when we pitched it to Freevee we pretended like it was a sure thing. Thank God we pulled it off.”
Adds Marsden, “What interested me was the challenge of creating a hero’s journey for someone who has no idea the world around him was completely manufactured, and whether or not this high wire act could lead him to unite this family of wonderful weirdos and in the process become an inspiring leader for us all under the process of serving Jury Duty.”
Will you report for Freevee’s Jury Duty in April?
