HBO has made it official that Mahershala Ali – who, on our last update on July 1, was said to be in negotiations to star in a potential third season of the critically-acclaimed anthology crime drama series True Detective – will indeed star in the next installment of the series created and written by Nic Pizzolatto.
The news was revealed at HBO’s summer TCA presentation moments ago, by president of programming Casey Bloys. Although no other details were shared, specifically, on what story season 3 will follow, and who else might join Ali in the cast.
Previously, even though a 3rd season hadn’t been officially given the greenlight at the time, in July 2016, Bloys said that there was the possibility of another run at the series, stating: “It is not dead. I talked to Nic about it and both Nic and HBO are open to another season. I don’t think Nic has a take and he’s working on some other projects. We’re open to somebody else writing it and Nic supervising it. It’s a valuable franchise, it’s not dead, we just don’t have a take for a third season yet.”
This came shortly after McConaughey said he would hypothetically be interested in reprising his role as Rust Cohle in a third season. Although no word on whether HBO is actually considering his return.
As I said previously, Ali – with an Oscar win (for Moonlight) now behind him, as well as roles in upcoming high-profile studio pictures including Triple Frontier and Alita: Battle Angel – is certainly an exciting choice, and I think many of us will be looking forward to seeing who else will join him in the cast (hopefully it’s another black actor – maybe a black woman – but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that), and who the team behind the camera will be, and what story they’ll tell. I just hope it’s better than season 2.
Ali appeared in 2 of the most talked-about films of the last awards season: Hidden Figures and Moonlight, for which he won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, his first nomination and win. Coming up, he co-stars in the 2017 Sundance break out selection Roxanne Roxanne.
He’s repped by WME.
Ali also put a post on Instagram about it:
