Robert De Niro is getting some A-list backup in his new series, Zero Day, for Netflix.
Deadline reported that Lizzy Caplan, Jesse Plemons, Joan Allen, and Connie Britton have all been cast in main roles alongside De Niro in Zero Day. Caplin will play a young Congresswoman named Alexandra Mullen; Plemons is Roger Carlson, a former “body man” for Mullen; Allen is a former First Lady named Sheila Mullen; and Britton is a “savvy, intelligent political operative” named Valerie Whitesell who was Mullen's former Chief of Staff.
This announcement comes almost two months after Netflix initially announced Zero Day. De Niro will serve as an executive producer on a TV series for the first time and will produce alongside creator/executive producer Eric Newman (under his Grand Electric Productions deal with Netflix) and fellow creator/executive producer Noah Oppenheim. Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael S. Schmidt, Jonathan Glickman, and director Lesli Linka Glatter will serve as executive producers as well. The series will be a six-episode limited series.
The official logline for Zero Day reads: “Zero Day asks the question on everyone’s mind — how do we find truth in a world in crisis, one seemingly being torn apart by forces outside our control? And in an era rife with conspiracy theory and subterfuge, how much of those forces are products of our own doing, perhaps even of our own imagining? “
Robert De Niro is a legend of his craft and a transition to the smaller screen is not unusual for legendary actors (Al Pacino and Sylvester Stallone have both done it for a number of projects and even Harrison Ford has). Fun fact: De Niro will be sharing the screen with Plemons once again after appearing alongside him in The Irishman and will also be seen together in Martin Scorsese's upcoming Killers of the Flower Moon.