Sony Pictures Classics via Everett Collection
Wait, what? Bill Murray is heading to the small screen? According to Deadline, Murray has joined the cast of HBO’s Olive Kitteridge, the miniseries based on Elizabeth Strout’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about a small New England town (with an Old England title).
The miniseries, adapted by Jane Anderson and directed by Lisa Cholodenko (The Kids Are All Right), will follow the tough and moral titular Olive (Frances McDormand) and “a seemingly placid New England town fraught with illicit affairs, crime and tragedy.” Murray is set to play Jack Kinnison, a widower and member of the town whom Olive befriends.
Other cast members include the likes of Richard Jenkins (Olive’s husband), the recently added Rosemarie DeWitt, John Gallagher Jr., Zoe Kazan, Jesse Plemons, and Cory Michael Smith. And to add even more names to the list, Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman are executive producing with McDormand and Anderson.
The casting news comes as a pleasant suprise considering that Murray already has a full plate of upcoming projects. (The usually elusive actor is starring in Monuments Men, The Grand Budapest Hotel, St. Vincent De Van Nuys, and Cameron Crowe’s untitled film.) By the looks of it, Murray has dived head first back into his acting career, and we’re definitely not complaining. In fact, we’re hoping that he’ll swim over to a little project called Ghostbusters III. We all know Dan Aykroyd would jump up and down in excitement (as would we).
