TNT is finally getting around to letting its viewers know what will replace the well-shod, Rizzoli & Isles-shaped hearts in their lives. First up is a look into William Shakespeare’s past, before he was being played by Michael Jackson impersonator Joseph Fiennes as a struggling playwright besotted with Gwyneth Paltrow. Deadline reports that TNT has ordered 10 episodes of Will, a drama “chronicling the wild 20s” of the Bard, as played by newcomer Laurie Davidson. The cringe-inducing description of the show alludes to the “punk-rock theater scene” of the Elizabethan Age you never learned about in history class, because it didn’t exist, just as the songs from Will’s modern soundtrack didn’t exist back then. Will was created by Craig Pearce, Baz Luhrmann’s longtime writing partner, and the pilot was directed by Elizabeth’s Shekhar Kapur.
The new lineup also includes a glimpse at a house divided against itself—that house is America, and the show is Civil, from A Simple Plan writer/producer Scott Smith. The political and social drama tracks the unrest in this country following a “hotly contested Presidential election.” According to Deadline, we’ll then see the nation “plunging uncontrollably into a modern day Civil War.” There will be lots of personal accounts from all manner of fictional citizens “whose actions—amplified in an age of instant media—add fuel to the conflict and affect the fate of the entire country.” Maybe they should all watch the current season of Veep for some pointers on how to stave off the dissolution of the union in the wake of a tight Pesidential race.