The cast for the upcoming Joe Exotic limited series at Peacock has found its Howard Baskin, as Deadline is reporting that Emmy nominee Kyle MacLachlan (Twin Peaks) is set to join the cast in the key role.
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MacLachlan will play Howard Baskin, husband to Carole Baskin (Kate McKinnon) and someone who supports his wife throughout the entirety of the Netflix documentary. The limited series will center on Carole Baskin, a big cat enthusiast who learns about fellow exotic animal lover Joe “Exotic” Schreibvogel (John Cameron Mitchell) breeding and using big cats for profit. She’ll set out to shut down the venture, kickstarting a huge feud between the two that has now become notorious.
The series was first announced as being in development in November and in an effort to combat the streaming wars, NBCU has set the series for a multi-platform airing across NBC, fresh streaming platform Peacock and USA Network, where it was originally set up. This business model is a similar setup to Hulu’s deal with multiple networks of simultaneous streaming programs after their on-air debuts, as well as HBO’s with their platform HBO Max.
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Netflix’s docuseries Tiger King first introduced the world to the bizarre nature of Exotic and Baskin’s story this past March and became an overnight sensation, trending across multiple social media platforms, in news headlines and reaching an audience of 34.3 million unique viewers within the first 10 days of its debut. This success led to the ordering of a follow-up special hosted by Joel McHale (Community), a follow-up docuseries at Investigation Discovery and the Cage-starring scripted series at CBS Television Studios, based on the Texas Monthly article “Joe Exotic: A Dark Journey Into the World of a Man Gone Wild” by Leif Reigstad.
