Yeoh joins "American Born Chinese" / "Goosebumps" series / Disney+ Anne Frank film / "Vikings: Valhalla" trailer

Plus today's calendar, "The Dropout" first look, "Shining Girls" teaser, Disney+ "Cheaper by the Dozen" remake, and more

Inside.com Part of   Network February 07, 2022

Michelle Yeoh "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings" star Michelle Yeoh and director Destin Daniel Cretton will reunite for the Disney+ series "American Born Chinese." The action-comedy series is based on the graphic novel by Gene Luen Yang, and comes from "Bob's Burgers" vet Kelvin Yu. More: The series stars Ben Wang ("MacGyver") as Jin Wang, an average American teenager who becomes embroiled in a battle between mythological Chinese gods. Yeoh will co-star as Jin's aunt Guanyin, who is also secretly the Buddhist bodhisattva of Compassion. Yu will serve as executive producer and showrunner; Cretton will direct episodes and also executive produce. DEADLINE

Disney+ greenlit a 10-episode series based on R.L. Stine's classic "Goosebumps" books. The show will center on a group of five high school friends who inadvertently unleash a supernatural menace in their hometown. More: Rob Letterman, who directed the 2015 "Goosebumps" film, will direct the pilot and write the scripts in collaboration with Nick Stoller ("The Carmichael Show"). A sequel film was released in 2018; collectively, the two "Goosebumps" movies grossed around $250 million. "Goosebumps" ranks as one of the best-selling book series of all time, with more than 400 million English-language copies in print, along with translations in 32 languages. Disney+ also produces a series based on Stine's "Just Beyond" graphic novels. VARIETY

DAILY CALENDAR MONDAY, FEBRUARY 7 AGATHA RAISIN: The British comedy-drama series -- based on the novels by M.C. Beaton -- stars Ashley Jensen as a former PR agent who solves mysteries in the deceptively quaint village of Carsely. Season 4 comes to Acorn TV today. [Acorn TV] BACKYARD BAR WARS: Comic reality competition series from TruTV in which two neighbors each build and staff their own backyard bars, in an attempt to create the buzzier local destination. Chris Distefano hosts. Season 1 hits HBO Max today. [HBO Max]

Miep and Jan Gies with Otto Frank in 1961 Disney+ ordered a limited series based on the true story of Mipe Gies, the Dutch woman who agreed to hide Anne Frank and her family from the Nazis during World War II. "A Small Light" will be produced by National Geographic, ABC Signature, and Israel's Keshet Studios. More: "Grey's Anatomy" vets Joan Rater and Tonna Phelan will write the series; Susanna Fogel ("The Flight Attendant") will direct some episodes and is also on board as an executive producer. Miep and her husband Jan hid eight Jews -- including her employer Otto Frank, his wife Edith, and his daughters Anne and Margot -- in an area of their home that became known as the "Secret Annex." Miep was also responsible for safeguarding Anne's diary until the end of the war, when it was submitted for publication by Otto Frank, the family's sole survivor. Gies died in 2010 at the age of 100. DEADLINE

Vikings: Valhalla NEW TRAILERS JEEN-YUHS: A KANYE TRILOGY: Filmmakers Clarence "Coodie" Simmons and Chike Ozah spent decades chronicling the enigmatic Chicago rapper and producer's life and career for this three-part biographical docuseries, which debuted last month during the Sundance Film Festival. The first episode will screen in theaters nationwide for one day on February 10, and hits Netflix everywhere on February 16. [Netflix] THE MARVELOUS MRS. MAISEL: The fourth season of the comedy-drama series -- about a former housewife (Rachel Brosnahan) embarking on a stand-up comedy career in the 1960s -- debuts on February 18. Co-stars Alex Borstein, Michael Zegen, Marin Hinkle, Tony Shalhoub, Kevin Pollak and Caroline Aaron all return for the new episodes; Jason Alexander joins the cast this year. [Amazon] VIKINGS: VALHALLA: This spin-off of the History Channel Viking drama series is set 100 years later, as tensions mount between the Vikings and the English, and Christian believers clash with those who still worship the old Norse gods. Characters include explorer Leif Eriksson (Sam Corlett), his sister Freydis Eriksdotter (Frida Gustavsson), and Nordic prince Harald Sigurdsson (Leo Suter). The series arrives on February 25. [Netflix] THE DROPOUT: Amanda Seyfried stars as disgraced Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes, who was found guilty on four counts of fraud by a federal jury back in January, in this limited series from Hulu. "Lost" vet Naveen Andrews co-stars as Holmes' former business partner, Ramesh "Sunny Balwani"; the cast also includes William H. Macy, Laurie Metcalf, Elizabeth Marvel, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Stephen Fry, Michael Ironside, Alan Ruck, and Sam Waterston. It debuts on March 3. [Hulu] CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN: Family comedy feature based on the 1948 semi-autobiographical novel by Frank Bunker Gilbreth Jr. and his sister Ernestine Gilbreth Carey, which previously inspired a 1950 movie and a series of films starring Steve Martin the '00s. The new version stars Gabrielle Union and Zach Braff as a couple who form a new large family along with their many children from previous marriages. Kenya Barris and "Grown-ish" vet Jenifer Rice-Genzuk Henry wrote the script. The film debuts on March 18. [Disney+] SHINING GIRLS: Psychological thriller series based on the 2013 novel by Lauren Beukes. Elisabeth Moss stars as a Chicago newspaper archivist whose life is interrupted by a brutal and traumatic assault. Upon further investigation, she discovers her attack is mysteriously linked to a number of cold cases. Jamie Bell, Wagner Moura, Phillipa Soo, and Amy Brenneman co-star; Silka Luisa ("Strange Angel") wrote the adaptation and served as showrunner. It debuts on April 29. [Apple TV+]

Zendaya responded to criticism of HBO's "Euphoria" from representatives of the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) program during a conversation with Entertainment Weekly. A representative of D.A.R.E. criticized the series for glamorizing "addiction, anonymous sex, violence, and other destructive behaviors" to high school students in comments to TMZ. More: Zendaya, who stars as Rue Bennett on the drama series, told EW: "Our show is in no way a moral tale to teach people how to live their life or what they should be doing." Niki King, who co-stars as Rue's on-screen mother, added: "We need to see this Bennett family really go through it because that’s the only way the audience and people who are also going through this in real life understand." "Euphoria" creator Sam Levinson mined his own personal experiences with addiction when writing the series. INDIEWIRE

Catherine Zeta-Jones joined the cast of the upcoming Disney+ adventure series "National Treasure." The film comes from the same creative team as the movie franchise, including producer Jerry Bruckheimer, director Jon Turteltaub, and writers Marianne and Cormac Wibberley. More: Lisette Alexis will star as Jess, a DREAMer searching for clues about her family's history on both sides of the US-Mexico border. Zeta-Jones will play Billie, a "badass billionaire" and black-market antiquities expert. Lyndon Smith, Zuri Reed, Jake Austin Walker, Antonio Cipriano, and Jordan Rodrigues fill out the cast. Filmmaker Mira Nair ("Monsoon Wedding") will direct the pilot. DEADLINE

Nickelodeon and Paramount formed a new creative partnership that will produce multiple new projects featuring The Smurfs. The first film to emerge from the new banner will be an animated musical written by "South Park" vet Pam Brady. More: The deal will also extend the current Nickelodeon animated "Smurfs" series for an additional 26-episode season. The Smurfs IP was previously held by Sony, which produced three theatrical films featuring the characters that collectively grossed over $1 billion worldwide. The Smurfs were originally created by Belgian artist Pierre Culliford, also known as Peyo. HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

QUICK HITS 3D is the future of online shopping. With unlimited3D.com from Threedium, you can publish and share 3D & AR to the web with ease.* Due to Sony's pre-existing licensing deals, "Spider-Man: No Way Home" -- the highest-grossing film of 2021 -- will make its streaming debut on Starz sometime in the next six months, before it comes to Disney+. Disney Channel vets Peyton Elizabeth Lee ("Doogie Kamealoha MD") and Milo Manheim ("Zombies") signed on for the Disney+ teen rom-com "Prom Pact"; "Modern Family" star Julie Bowen will produce the film. "The Matrix Resurrections" co-producer Village Roadshow filed suit against Warner Bros. in Los Angeles over the studio's decision to simultaneously release the film to theaters and HBO Max; the lawsuit claims that WarnerMedia pushed the film's release up to 2021 from 2022 specifically to bolster its HBO Max subscriber count. Ted Sarandos commemorated the 10th anniversary of Netflix's very first original series -- the crime comedy "Lilyhammer" -- in an essay published on Sunday. "All of Us Are Dead" is now Korea's second original series to hit the #1 spot in the Netflix U.S. Top 10; the first was last year's "Squid Game." Tinder has banned the so-called "Tinder Swindler," Shimon Hayut (aka Simon Leviev), following the release of a Netflix true-crime documentary alleging he has used the app to scam dozens of victims for more than $10 million. China's Tencent Video platform restored the original ending of "Fight Club," around two weeks after the streamer's modified version -- which adds a caption to the conclusion noting that law and order have been restored -- went viral worldwide. Comcast and ViacomCBS received regulatory approval to launch the joint streaming venture SkyShowtime across more than 20 European territories. Britain's Channel 5 announced it will stop funding the 37-year-old Australian soap "Neighbours," giving studio Fremantle around six months to find a new producing partner. The video for K-pop girl group BLACKPINK's song "How You Like That" has surpassed 1 billion views on YouTube. If you think time in the market outweighs timing the market, this finance app is for you.* *This is sponsored content

Lon Harris is the writer and editor of Inside Streaming and was the very first person to ever write an Inside newsletter. He lives in Los Angeles, California, and also writes about TV and film for Fandom, Screen Junkies, Rotten Tomatoes, Gamma Ray and others. Plus he has a Game of Thrones podcast called "Casterly Talk" and competes on The Movie Trivia Schmoedown as "The Professor." Editor Jonathan Harris is a writer for Inside.com. Previously, he wrote for The Huffington Post, TakePart.com, and the YouTube channel What’s Trending.

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