NBC is developing Need to Know, a new spy procedural that reunites The Best Man collaborators Taye Diggs and Malcolm D. Lee.
Diggs will star and executive produce alongside Lee, who’s set to direct and executive produce through his company Blackmaled Productions. The series is inspired by true events and follows a battle-scarred CIA veteran (Diggs) who must partner with a cocky young officer as they run some of the agency’s most daring operations from a covert base in South Florida.
The pilot was written by Alexander Maggio (FBI, Homeland), a former intelligence analyst who worked with the Defense Intelligence Agency before joining the CIA. If the show moves forward to series, Terence Paul Winter (The Rookie, The Equalizer) will take over as writer and executive producer.
Additional executive producers include Dominique Telson, Jerry O’Shea, and John Sipher of Spycraft Entertainment, with Michael Scott Allen and Rachel Harner serving as co-executive producers. Need to Know hails from Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group.
For Diggs, Need to Know adds another major TV role to his already extensive résumé, which includes All American, Private Practice, and Murder in the First.
In addition to Need to Know, Lee is also developing Becoming Marlow Fin for Peacock — a dramatic adaptation of Ellen Won Steil’s novel about a global superstar defending her innocence in her sister’s disappearance. Lee is also prepping an untitled 2026 feature starring Lynn Whitfield, Chloe Bailey, and Coco Jones, and recently released his debut novel The Best Man: Unfinished Business, the first in a planned trilogy continuing the beloved film franchise.