PopUps: Sarah Paulson Latest Actor to Join Ryan Murphy's 'Feud'
Casting news of Ryan Murphy's upcoming anthology series "Feud" continues to slay.
The showrunner took to Twitter last week to reveal Catherine Zeta-Jones would be joining the FX show. On Tuesday, Murphy once again used the social media platform to tell fans Sarah Paulson is joining the "Feud" family.
After wowing audiences and critics on "American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson" as prosecutor Marcia Clark, Paulson, a longtime Murphy muse, is an welcome edition to "Feud," which already stars Jessica Lange and Susan Sarandon.
"Feud," which will go into production this fall and is slated to air in early 2017, tells the story of the backstage drama between Joan Crawford and Bette Davis while filming the 1962 film "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?" Lange will play Crawford and Sarandon will play Davis. Zeta-Jones will star as Olivia de Havilland.
Vanity Fair sheds some light on Paulson's role as Geraldine Page, writing, she "was an accomplished actress across TV, film, and Broadway; she received seven Academy Award nominations before finally winning Best Actress in 1986 for "The Trip to Bountiful," and won the Emmy for Outstanding Single Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in both 1967 and 1969. She never received a Tony, but was nominated four times for Best Actress in a Play, and in 1983 she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame."
But how will Page play into the "Feud" story? TVanity Fair suggests the following:
Back in 1963, Davis was nominated for Best Actress at the Academy Awards for her turn in "Baby Jane"-which, of course, did not thrill Crawford, who struck a deal with the other nominees (including Page) to accept the award on their behalf, should they be absent. At the ceremony, as the award drew near, de Havilland accompanied Davis (her friend) backstage. But Anne Bancroft ended up winning the award instead, for her role in "The Miracle Worker."
The rest of the "Feud" cast includes Alfred Molina as director Robert Aldrich, Stanley Tucci as film exec Jack L. Warner, and Judy Davis as gossip columnist Hedda Hopper.