CBS has given a series order to “Doubt,” its legal drama from Tony Phelan and Joan Rater.

Laverne Cox of “Orange Is the New Black” fame co-stars in the series in which she’ll play a transgender Ivy League-educated attorney, described as “fierce and funny” as well as “competitive as she is compassionate,” who has “experienced injustice first hand,” and is inclined to “fight all the harder for her clients,” per the CBS press release.

“Doubt” hails from the husband-and-wife writing/executive-producing team, Tony Phelan and Joan Rater (“Grey’s Anatomy,” “Madam Secretary”), and will focus on a defense lawyer (Katherine Heigl) at a firm who gets romantically involved with one of her clients (Steven Pasquale) – a faux pas made worse by the fact that he may or may not be guilty of a brutal crime.




Dulé Hill, Dreama Walker, Elliott Gould, Kobi Libii round out the cast.

This would be another TV history-making event for Cox who recently made history, becoming the first openly transgender actress to earn an Emmy nomination. Her role in “Doubt” will make Cox’s role the first broadcast TV transgender series regular character who is also played by an openly transgender actress. Prior to Cox, Candis Cayne made similar headlines in 2007 for portraying transgender mistress Carmelita on ABC’s prime time drama “Dirty Sexy Money,” becoming the first openly transgender actress to play a recurring transgender character in primetime TV (emphasis on “recurring” which is different from “series regular” which is what differentiates Cayne’s accomplishment from Cox’s).

This may prove to be CBS’ replacement for “The Good Wife,” another legal drama that ended its 7-season run this year.