LaChanze and Joe Morton are among seven new guest stars joining The Best of Us, Paramount+’s upcoming limited series about the decade-long legal fight for 9/11 first responder compensation, as production begins in New York City.
The six-episode series dramatizes the legal case that secured nearly $1 billion in compensation for first responders who fell gravely ill after working at Ground Zero, a fight that stretched almost a decade. Jeremy Strong leads the cast as class-action lawyer Jason Smith, who took on entrenched institutions in the process, confronting politics, greed, corruption, and betrayal set against the backdrop of the emergency workers’ unity and bravery during the World Trade Center’s collapse.
They’re joined by Richard Schiff (The West Wing), Elizabeth Rodriguez (Orange Is the New Black), Jen Tullock (Severance), William Baldwin (Disaster Strike Force), and Keith W. Richards (Uncut Gems). Character details for the new additions have not been disclosed.
The new additions join a previously announced cast that includes Barry Pepper as Coach, a former NYPD officer and 9/11 first responder battling leukemia from his work at Ground Zero; Andrea Riseborough as Molly, Coach’s wife; Neal Huff as Peter Allen, a pragmatic colleague at Jason’s law firm; Gaby Hoffmann as Kathleen McCormick, an FDNY firefighter and activist; Sky Yang as a mysterious young homeless man known as The Lost Son; and John Slattery as James Leavitt, a formidable defense attorney.
The casting carries added weight for LaChanze, whose husband, Calvin Gooding, was killed in the September 11 attacks while working at Cantor Fitzgerald in Tower One of the World Trade Center. She was eight months pregnant with their second daughter at the time.
The Best of Us is written, directed, and executive produced by Tobias Lindholm, with Frank Pugliese writing and executive producing alongside him. Strong also serves as an executive producer, along with Tony Hernandez. The series is produced by Paramount Television Studios and Sister.