Scrubs star Donald Faison will play Professor Drake Utonium in The CW’s live-action reboot of the colorful cartoon series The Powerpuff Girls. The upcoming series, now simply titled as Powerpuff, was first announced by the network last year. Prior to Faison’s casting, the show had already found its three leads as well, as Powerpuff will star Chloe Bennet as Blossom, Dove Cameron as Bubbles, and Yana Perrault as Buttercup.
Per Variety, Faison’s live-action take on Professor Drake Utonium is described as “quirky, debonair, and a pinch narcissistic. He is a scientific genius who is immensely proud of the three extraordinary girls he created in his lab. Staring down a midlife crisis, he is determined to repair his relationships with his now-adult daughters.”
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Fans may know Donald Faison best from his role as Dr. Chris Turk on the popular sitcom Scrubs, a role he spent nine years playing. These days, Faison hosts the podcast Fake Doctors Real Friends with his Scrubs co-star Zach Braff. He also had a starring role as Phil Chase on the TV Land comedy series The Exes and has appeared in movies like Clueless, Kick-Ass 2, and Game Over, Man!.
Conceived as a sequel to the original Cartoon Network series created by Craig McCracken, Powerpuff moves the story forward with Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup now young adults and retired superheroes. The new show will follow the “pint-sized superheroes as disillusioned twentysomethings who resent having lost their childhood to crime fighting. Will they agree to reunite now that the world needs them more than ever?”
McCracken recently spoke about the Powerpuff Girls reboot in an interview with Syfy, and while he’s not involved with the project “in any way, shape, or form,” the creator of the original cartoon is heading into the live-action reboot with optimism and wishing the cast and crew success.
“I kind of found out that they were considering doing that like a year ago, and that’s all I know about it,” McCracken said. “Yeah, I’m not part of that production in any way … It’s one of these things where I don’t own those characters [they] are owned by…well, I don’t even know who owns it now because of the Warner Bros. / AT&T merger. It’s one of those companies that owns the rights, so they can do what they want with it.”
The creator adds: “I’m curious to see what they do with it. The initial concept of Powerpuff Girls was the idea that they were little kids being superheroes, so the fact that they’re making them grow up, that sort of changes that initial concept. But we’ll see what they do with it.”
Powerpuff is written by executive producers Heather Regnier and Diablo Cody, with Cody executive producing under his Vita Vera Films banner. Greg Berlanti, Sarah Schechter, and David Madden will also exec produce via Berlanti Productions. Erika Kennair will produce with Warner Bros. Television, and Maggie Kiley will direct and exec produce the pilot.
A premiere date hasn’t yet been revealed for Powerpuff on The CW. This news comes to us from Variety.
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