Rian Johnson will bring his imaginative worldbuilding to the small screen with a new series called Poker Face. Peacock announced today that it has issued a straight-to-series order of 10 episodes for the hour-long mystery show from T-Street and MRC Television. Russian Doll actress Natasha Lyonne is set to star.
Johnson will helm the original series in addition to writing and executive producing alongside Ram Bergman and T-Street television president Nena Rodrigue. Lyonne will also executive produce through her production company Animal Pictures, along with co-executive producers Maya Rudolph and Danielle Renfrew Behrens.
“I’m very excited to dig into the type of fun, character-driven, case-of-the-week mystery goodness I grew up watching,” said Johnson in a statement. It’s my happy place. Having Natasha as a partner in crime is a dream, and we’ve found the perfect home at Peacock.”
“Rian Johnson’s distinct sensibility and talent for telling edge-of-your-seat mysteries is a massive gift for Peacock, and we can’t wait for audiences to delve into each case,” added Lisa Katz, President, Scripted Content, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming. “Paired with the acting genius of Natasha Lyonne, this series will be entertaining and addictive.”
According to a source close to the project, Collider has learned the series is modeled after detective shows of the '70s and '80s but is doing its own thing. Both Johnson and Lyonne’s past work suits them well for this type of project. Aside from Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Johnson is best known for directing Knives Out, the character-driven thriller/mystery film that earned an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.
Lyonne, meanwhile, has spent the past season making a name for herself on the Netflix series Russian Doll, where she stars as a game coder who keeps dying and re-living an event over and over again. In addition to co-creating, starring, co-writing, and directing on the Netflix series, she also recently executive produced Sarah Cooper: Everything’s Fine. Lyonne launched her production company Animal Pictures in 2018 with Renfrew Behrens.
Meanwhile, Johnson and Bergman launched T-Street Television in 2019 and are currently working on a follow-up film to Knives Out as well as Netflix’s The Three-Body Problem with Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.
Currently, there is no scheduled release date for Poker Face, but check back with Collider for that info as soon as we have it.