Late last year, Lizzy Caplan signed on to star in a series adaptation of Fatal Attraction for Paramount+, playing “a woman who becomes obsessed with her lover after a brief affair” (you know, like in the movie Fatal Attraction). When the project was announced, Paramount+ said it would be a “deep-dive reimagining of the classic psychosexual thriller” told “through the lens of modern attitudes toward strong women, personality disorders, and coercive control.”
Today, the streamer announced that Joshua Jackson will be playing Dan Gallagher, “the object of his lover’s obsession after a brief affair” (like in the movie Fatal Attraction). In a statement, Nicole Clemens, Paramount+’s President Of Original Scripted Series, said that Jackson and Caplan “are perfectly matched to tell a nuanced and modern narrative about the complexities of the human psyche.”
So, again, they’re going for some kind of more thoughtful angle on the Fatal Attraction premise beyond that “man has an affair with a woman and she becomes obsessed with him” thriller concept. It certainly seems a little more interesting than just taking an old movie and padding it out into a TV show, whether or not it works out as well as they’re planning.
It better at least be somewhat worth the trouble, since this is supposedly the project that Lizzy Caplan is doing instead of the Party Down reboot. Then again, there’s no guarantee that that will even be good, since it’s a Rob Thomas-created project and his revival of Veronica Mars was so crummy. Either way, the new Party Down and the new Fatal Attraction are definitely in direct competition and we’re all going to have to pick sides about which one is better.
As for Joshua Jackson, he’s been in a lot of things since he was on Dawson’s Creek, so it’s probably not fair to always bring that up when he’s cast in something new, but he was Pacey on Dawson’s Creek. More recently, he starred on Peacock’s Dr. Death series with Christian Slater.
