Exclusive: Jennifer Aniston, Jason Momoa, Hailee Steinfeld, and more preview their AppleTV+ shows
Apple is officially getting into the streaming game with the launch of AppleTV+ on Nov. 1, and EW has an exclusive look at the star-studded slate of original programming.
“The slate of talent that they amassed this season, it’s really exciting. Really exciting,” Truth Be Told star Octavia Spencer says of the new streamer’s roster. And we agree. Here’s just a taste of what’s to come from Apple:
THE MORNING SHOW (Nov. 1)
The Morning Show gives viewers an in-depth look at what goes on behind-the-scenes in the world of daybreak television. “There’s something sort of bulletproof about the morning show,” star Reese Witherspoon says. “They’re a stalwart part of American culture.” The series kicks off when Alex Levy (Jennifer Aniston) is left to pick up the pieces after her cohost of 15 years, Mitch Kessler (Steve Carell), is fired following allegations of sexual misconduct. “She’s unraveling,” Aniston says. “All of her lifelines are falling away.” And just as things fall apart, Witherspoon’s Bradley Jackson enters the picture. Jackson is a local West Virginia reporter who gains notoriety when a video of her arguing with a coal-mine protester goes viral and the Morning Show producers bring her on for an interview. As showrunner Kerry Ehrin puts it, “Bradley’s got a little screw loose.” —Samantha Highfill
(For more on The Morning Show, read our full Fall TV Preview issue cover story now and buy the full magazine when it’s on stands later this week.)
DICKINSON (Nov. 1)
Emily Dickinson: celebrated American poet and sexually fluid iconoclast with a vocabulary borrowed from Clueless? That’s how Dickinson imagines the death-obsessed writer. And for star Hailee Steinfeld, it’s in perfect step with Emily’s essence. “She didn’t belong in that time. She had a very modern way of thinking and acting,” she says. Adds creator Alena Smith: “This show is up to something a bit bigger than just being a Dickinson biopic. It’s using the 1850s as a distorted lens for our world today. Young people today feel a sense of doom, similar to what someone in the oncoming of the Civil War might have felt.” Turns out existential dread never goes out of style. —Maureen Lee Lenker
FOR ALL MANKIND (Nov. 1)
Imagine a world where the Soviet Union beat the U.S. to the moon and the space race continued for decades. “We’re starting with how history changes,” says Ronald D. Moore, who created this “alternate history” drama with Matt Wolpert and Ben Nedivi. “We jump months, sometimes years, and you’ll see the ripple effects: We pull out of Vietnam earlier; Nixon goes in hard on the space program.” There’s also a moon station, but it’s not sci-fi. “The world is real,” says Joel Kinnaman, who stars as an astronaut. “It feels like this Mad Men world, but where it all keeps expanding. I’ve never been part of anything so well written.” —Patrick Gomez
SEE (Nov. 1)
A virus causes everybody in the world to go blind. Thousands of years pass. Then twins are born able to — you guessed it — see. That’s the world crafted by writer Steven Knight and director Francis Lawrence. “It’s not as if people lost their sight and it’s awful,” says Knight. “The human race has adapted. Their other senses have been enhanced.” Game of Thrones’ Jason Momoa stars in what he calls the toughest role of his career: “He’s a great warrior trying to keep his family together — just imagine if Khal Drogo got to live on.” —James Hibberd
SERVANT (December TBA)
When Tony Basgallop pitched M. Night Shyamalan this psychological thriller about parents (Lauren Ambrose and Toby Kebbell) who hire some help (Nell Tiger Free), the EP couldn’t resist. “What’s unusual is it’s set in one location. It’s the perfect setting for paranoia,” says Shyamalan, who also couldn’t resist hiring Harry Potter’s Rupert Grint as the mysterious Julian Pierce. “He’s a truly gifted actor,” he says of the former child star. “These four actors are in this almost playlike show. They all buzz with this… energy.” —P.G.
TRUTH BE TOLD (December TBA)
“It’s a crime drama centered on the ripple effect in families when they’re touched by crime,” creator Nichelle Tramble Spellman says of Truth Be Told, which is inspired by Kathleen Barber’s novel Are You Sleeping and stars Octavia Spencer, Lizzy Caplan, and Aaron Paul. The drama follows a journalist (Spencer) revisiting a decades-old murder, and the wounds that are reopened for all involved. “My character has to examine if she helped put an innocent boy in prison,” says Spencer. “We’re exploring the consequences when the pursuit of justice is on a public stage.” —P.G.
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