FOX’s 24 reboot, 24: Legacy keeps rounding out its principle cast, and has now gotten a long-time TV veteran on board. The drama just added Emmy winning actor Jimmy Smits to the cast.
According to Deadline, Jimmy Smits has signed on to the role of John Donovan, a powerful United States Senator who would like to keep climbing the political ladder.
Jimmy Smits has had a long, well-received career in television and movies. He first came to prominence playing lawyer Victor Sifuentes on the NBC legal drama L.A. Law from 1986 through 1992. The actor then had a co-starring role on the massively popular police drama NYPD Blue. Smits has also had large parts on The West Wing, Dexter and appeared on the last three seasons of the biker crime drama Sons of Anarchy; he’s currently wrapping up a one season run on the Netflix series The Get Down. Film-wise, he’s appeared in Old Gringo, My Family, Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith.
Jimmy Smits has a history of picking strong dramas to show off his acting chops, and he’s benefitted greatly from that. He’s gotten a whopping 43 award nominations during his career, including 12 Primetime Emmy nods (he won Outstanding Supporting Actor in 1990 for L.A. Law) and four Golden Globe nominations (winning in Best Actor In A Drama for NYPD Blue in 1996).
24: Legacy will, of course, pick up the storytelling reigns from the acclaimed Kiefer Sutherland series 24 which had its initial run from 2001 to 2010. The critical and audience darling received 192 award nominations, winning 65 of them during its run. 24 focused on the missions of Jack Bauer, the Director of Field Ops for the Counter-Terrorist Unit (CTU) of Los Angeles. His yearly races against time to thwart terrorist plots were detailed in a distinctive real-time style that upped the drama to maximum levels for its entire time on the air.
The reboot will still involve CTU, and the basic storytelling style made famous by the original show, but will feature all new characters and cast members. The story of 24: Legacy will concentrate on military hero Eric Carter (Corey Hawkins, Straight Outta Compton and Iron Man 3) and his return to the States. Carter has some trouble follow him home and he’s compelled to bring the CTU in to help save him, and stop a plot that could end up being one of the largest scale terrorist attacks in America. Hawkins and Jimmy Smits will be joined by Miranda Otto (Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and the upcoming Westworld), Teddy Sears (The Flash and Masters of Sex) and Anna Diop (Everybody Hates Chris and Quantico).
Right now, all that’s been ordered by FOX is a pilot for 24: Legacy, but if we know anything about this new iteration of the modern classic, it’s that it will only be made better by Jimmy Smits showing up in it.
