Dallas roots run deep in many of this fall's new TV shows. Get to know some of the North Texas talent you'll be seeing soon.
Scott Michael Foster and Chace Crawford
Blood & Oil
Scott Michael Foster, who is from Highland Village, keeps hearing that his new series, ABC's Blood & Oil, is a modern-day Dallas. Sure enough, both prime-time soaps focus on money, power, family, sex and contemporary cowboys. Blood & Oil involves the black-gold rush in current-day North Dakota.
"This sounds like sacrilege, since I grew up in Dallas," Foster says, "but I've never seen the original Dallas." But it's worth noting that Foster (whose past series include Greek, Zero Hour and Chasing Life) was born five years before the summer of "Who Shot J.R.?" "All I can say is I think people will enjoy our show for its originality as well as its familiarity," he says.
Co-star Chace Crawford, formerly of Gossip Girl, is from Plano. That's the Dallas connection that Foster finds more meaningful. The two actors quickly found a common interest. "We both love the Dallas Cowboys," Foster says. "Chace was at the home opener against the Giants on Sunday. I watched on TV and was texting him throughout."
Blood & Oil stars Don Johnson as Hap Briggs, the top dog in the fictional boomtown of Rock Springs. Crawford's Billy Lefever, an ambitious newcomer, is determined to give Hap a run for his money. Foster plays Hap's ne'er-do-well son Wick. It remains to be seen whether Billy and Wick become allies or adversaries — or both.
Jake McDorman
Limitless
Jake McDorman, the star of Limitless, a CBS sci-fi thriller, has asked himself this question many times: What if there were an acting equivalent to athletes and steroids? What if there was a drug that could turn him into an exponentially better performer? "It's tempting," the Richardson native says. "But I wouldn't want it. I'd rather muddle through with what I've got."
But in the show, McDorman's underachieving character, Brian Finch, takes the magic pill called NZT. It gives him superhuman brainpower and a dynamic new life. Limitless is based on the 2011 movie starring Bradley Cooper, who appears in the pilot. McDorman worked alongside Cooper in American Sniper. "I wasn't sure I should do it until Bradley told me I had his support," McDorman says. "Now I'm having the best time."
Stark Sands
Minority Report
Stark Sands says he has never been so exhausted. But it's the best kind of tired. On the work front, the Highland Park native stars in Fox's Minority Report. At home, Sands is a first-time dad. "So I'm pulling double duty," he says. "I work six days a week, long hours, and then, when I come home, my job is to take over for my wife with our 4-month-old son."
Sands, a two-time Tony Award nominee (Journey's End in 2007 and Kinky Boots in 2013), plays a genetically mutated psychic in the year 2065. His character, Dash, is a "precog" who foresees violent murders before they happen. He teams up with a homicide detective, played by Megan Good, in an effort to catch killers before they strike. "I am optimistic," Sands says. "Of everything I've done on television, this has the most buzz."
Marcia Gay Harden
Code Black
Marcia Gay Harden met and shadowed real-life emergency room doctors to prepare for Code Black, a fast-paced CBS medical drama. As a result, there are times when she feels like a fraud. After all, she merely pretends to save lives as Dr. Leanne Rorish, a buckaroo ER doc. "Trust me, I know what I don't know," says the Oscar winner (for 2000's Pollock). Harden, a proud Texan who used to live in Southlake and still has family in the area, was drawn to the series because of "the built-in, life-and-death, ticking-clock drama that everyone can relate to."
Also from North Texas
- Jaimie Alexander, the butt-kicking Jane Doe mystery woman of Blindspot, is from Grapevine (read our Q&A with her here).
Dallas native Nick Jonas has a bloody good role, literally, in Scream Queens.
Dallas native Anne Winters plays Jeremy Sisto's daughter in Wicked City.
Jill Marie Jones, a Dallas native (and former Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader), co-stars in horror-comedy series Ash vs. Evil Dead.
David Martindale, Special Contributor
