Scarlett Johansson will make her first major foray into television with a new TV adaptation of the 1992 John Katzenbach novel Just Cause.
The 38-year-old actress will both star in the new series and serve as executive producer, with Amazon handing out a straight-to-series order, via Deadline.
The project has a special connection to Johansson, who, at just 10 years of age, starred in the 1995 movie adaptation as the daughter of Sean Connery‘s character.
The original book followed a struggling Miami newspaper editorial writer named Matt Cowart, who receives a letter from a death row inmate, insisting his innocent of a heinous crime, as the journalist tries to set him free.
The movie adaptation changed the main character to Sean Connery’s Paul Armstrong, a Harvard law professor who is brought back into the courtroom to help a young Black man (Blair Underwood) who is accused of brutally murdering a young white girl.
This new series will follow Johansson’s character, a Florida reporter named Madison ‘Madi’ Cowart, described as, ‘a struggling reporter for a Florida newspaper sent to cover the final days of an inmate on death row.’
The series was picked up in what was described as, ‘a very competitive situation’ with Christy Hall (I Am Not Okay With This) writing the series.
Johansson will executive produce through her These Pictures production company, alongside writer Hall and These Pictures’ Jonathan Lia and Keenan Flynn.
The role will mark her first major starring role in a TV series, though she has appeared briefly in other shows throughout her career.
Her first ever professional acting gig was on a 1994 episode of Late Night with Conan O’Brien and she also appeared in the pilot of a TV adaptation of John Grisham’s The Client in 1995.
She also appeared as herself in a 2004 episode of Entourage and voiced a number of characters for the animated comedy series Robot Chicken.
The actress also lent her voice to an episode of HitRECord On TV and two episodes of Assassin Banana, while also portraying Ivanka Trump in 2017 and 2018 episodes of NBC’s Saturday Night Live.
Johansson was most recently seen on the big screen in her final foray into the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Black Widow, and voicing Ash in Sing 2.
She also has My Mother’s Wedding with Kristin Scott Thomas (who also directs), Freida Pinto and Siena Miller, and Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City in post-production.
The actress is currently filming Project Artemis with Channing Tatum, Ray Romano and Jim Rash.
