Starz's series based on Neil Gaiman's American Gods has been filming for several weeks now, but they've just made an entirely strange casting coup.
No, that headline wasn't a joke. The newest cast member is none other than Dane Cook, who will be playing the main character Shadow Moon's best friend Robbie, who "promises to hold his job for him while he’s in prison. Robbie is married to Audrey, best friend to Shadow’s wife Laura, and he provides another shoulder for Laura to cry on while Shadow is away."
This will be Dane Cook's first high profile role in quite some time, unless you count PLANES and PLANES: FIRE & RESCUE, which I certainly don't.
Bryan Fuller (Hannibal) and Michael Green (The River) are writing and serving as the showrunners. The plot centers on:
a war brewing between old and new gods: the traditional gods of mythological roots from around the world steadily losing believers to an upstart pantheon of gods reflecting society’s modern love of money, technology, media, celebrity and drugs. Its protagonist, Shadow Moon, is an ex-con who becomes bodyguard and traveling partner to Mr. Wednesday, a conman but in reality one of the older gods, on a cross-country mission to gather his forces in preparation to battle the new deities.
The series will also star Ian McShane as Mr. Wednesday, the smirking Norse God Odin; Pablo Schreiber as down-on-his-luck leprechaun Mad Sweeney; Ricky Whittle as our human protagonist, ex-convict Shadow Moon; Emily Browning as Shadow's wife, Laura Moon, Yetide Badaki as goddess of love Bilquis; Bruce Langley as New God Technical Boy; Crispin Glover as New Gods coalition leader Mr. World; and Jonathan Tucker as Shadow's confidante Low Key Lyesmith.
Also starring: Cloris Leachman as Zorya Vechernyaya, the eldest of three sisters who watch over the constellations; Peter Stormare as Slavic god of darkness and evil Czernobog; Chris Obi as Egyptian god of the death Anubis; and Mousa Kraish as The Jinn, a mythical creature of the fire who understands a person’s deepest desires better than they do. Gillian Anderson will be playing Media, the mouthpiece for the New Gods.
Orlando Jones will be playing Mr. Nancy, the African trickster god Anansi. Demore Barnes plays Mr. Ibis, the keeper of stories, past and present.