Drew Barrymore Timothy Olyphant Split - Getty - H 2016
Getty ImagesTimothy Olyphant and Drew Barrymore are headed to Netflix.
Olyphant and Barrymore have been tapped to star in the streaming giant’s original comedy series Santa Clarita Diet, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
Picked up straight to series, the single-camera comedy will premiere in 2017 and hails from writer Victor Fresco (Better Off Ted). The comedy centers on married couple Joel (Olyphant) and Sheila (Barrymore), realtors leading vaguely discontented lives in the Los Angeles suburb of Santa Clarita — until Sheila goes through a dramatic change that sends both of their lives down a road of death and destruction … but in a good way.
Fresco, Barrymore, Olyphant, Kapital Entertainment’s Aaron Kaplan, Tracy Katsky, Chris Miller and Ember Truesdell will executive produce the Netflix original. Barrymore’s Flower Films partner Nancy Juvonen will produce. An episode count has not yet been determined.
“The genius casting of Timothy and Drew, combined with Victor’s unique comedic sensibility, will delight, and definitely surprise, our members around the world,” said Netflix vp original content Cindy Holland.
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The casting marks Olyphant’s return to series-regular television following his Emmy-nominated starring turn in FX drama Justified, which ended its six-season run last year. His small-screen credits include HBO’s Deadwood, for which he earned a SAG nomination. Well-versed in comedy, the actor won a Critics’ Choice Award for his guest turn on Fox’s The Grinder this year and has made appearances in half-hours including The Office, The Mindy Project, The League, My Name Is Earl and Sex and the City. On the feature side, his credits include Go and The Girl Next Door. He’ll next be seen in Mother’s Day and Oliver Stone’s Snowden. He’s currently starring off-Broadway in Hold On to Me Darling. He’s repped by Brillstein Entertainment Partners.
Barrymore, meanwhile, will make her small-screen series-regular debut in Santa Clarita Diet. Her credits include features E.T., Never Been Kissed, Charlie’s Angels, 50 First Dates, Donnie Darko, Fever Pitch and HBO TV movie Grey Gardens, which netted her a Golden Globe and a SAG Award. She’s repped by CAA and Hansen Jacobson.
Veteran comedy writer-producer Fresco, repped by ICM Partners and Morris Yorn, counts My Name Is Earl, Mad About You, Evening Shade, Alf, Dinosaurs, Go On and Sean Saves the World among his credits.
Santa Clarita Diet joins a rapidly growing list of originals at the streaming giant. The order comes as Netflix is investing $5 billion into original programming in 2016. The streamer has been making an aggressive push into comedy, with an order this week for Easy, a comedic anthology from mumblecore guru Joe Swanberg. Santa Clarita Diet joins a comedy roster that also includes Aziz Ansari’s Master of None, Judd Apatow’s Love, Sophia Amoruso’s #Girlboss and sketch comedy The Characters, in addition to more broad-skewing fare like Fuller House.
