Television

‘LA Law’: Toks Olagundoye, Hari Nef & Ian Duff Join ABC Revival Pilot

EXCLUSIVE: Toks Olagundoye, Hari Nef and Ian Duff have been cast as series regulars in ABC drama pilot LA Law. They join original cast members Blair Underwood and Corbin Bernsen, who are reprising their roles as Jonathan Rollins and Arnie Becker, respectively, in the revival of the iconic Steven Bochco legal drama. Olagundoye, Hari Nef and Ian Duff all play new characters.

In the pilot, written by Marc Guggenheim and Ubah Mohamed and to be directed by Anthony Hemingway, the venerable law firm of McKenzie Brackman — now named Becker Rollins — reinvents itself as a litigation firm specializing in only the most high-profile, boundary-pushing and incendiary cases.

Olagundoye will play Assistant District Attorney Erika Jackson. In keeping with the Assistant District Attorney role played in the original series by Susan Day, Cecil Hoffman, and the late John Spencer, Olagundoye’s Erika Jackson is a force to be reckoned with in the courtroom, but is confronted by the role she plays in a carceral system as a deft attorney and as a woman of color.

Nef will play Alana Burke, a transgender lawyer who’s so formidable and creative in the courtroom that she makes actual headlines for her outside the box thinking.

Duff plays junior associate JJ Freeman, an idealistic hard-charger who has no problem speaking truth to power, including to his idol, Jonathan Rollins (Underwood), with whom he has fundamental disagreements about what it means to be a Black man in America in 2022.

Underwood, Guggenheim and Mohamed executive produce alongside Hemingway via Anthony Hemingway Productions and Dayna Bochco and Jesse Bochco via Steven Bochco Productions. 20th Television is the studio.

Olagundoye has a role in the Hulu pilot Career Opportunities In Murder And Mayham. Her TV series resume include stints on HBO’s Veep, Showtime’s Shameless and ABC’s The Neighbors and Castle. She was recently seen on ABC’s The Rookie and Disney+’s Big Shot. Olagundoye is repped by Paradigm and Aligned Talent Group.

Nef is known for her roles as Gittel in Prime Video’s Transparent, as Blythe in Netflix’s You and as Katherine the Season 4 opener of HBO’s Room 104. She’s currently in post-production on Simchas and Sorrows, a film she produced and stars in. Nef is repped by Gersh, Untitled Entertainment and Jackoway Austen Tyerman.

Duff can be seen in Shaka King’s Oscar-nominated film Judas and the Black Messiah opposite Daniel Kaluuya and Lakeith Stanfield. On TV, Duff was a series regular on The CW’s The Republic of Sarah and had a recurring on NBC’s New Amsterdam He is repped by Gersh and M88.

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