‘Rust Belt News’: Ravi Patel, Eric Edelstein & Johnny Jay Lee Join CBS Comedy Pilot
deadline.comEXCLUSIVE: Ravi Patel (Wonder Woman 1984), Eric Edelstein (Creepshow) and Johnny Jay Lee (NCIS: Los Angeles) are set as series regulars in CBS comedy pilot Rust Belt News, from The Simpsons writer and The Mindy Project exec producer Matt Warburton.
They join previously announced cast members Rich Sommer, Lauren Lindsey Donzis, Jayma Mays, Bailey Gavulic, Bentley Green and Angel Laketa Moore.Written by Warburton and directed by Jeff Blitz, the project is set in a small Ohio town where the local newspaper goes out of business, leaving the ambitious, angsty reporters of the high school newspaper as the only people left to report on scandals, dig up corruption, and generally polish the rust off this rust-belt community.Patel plays Dale, an emotionally needy principal at a working-class Ohio high school.
Edelstein portrays Joe, a goodhearted single father who takes a job as a night janitor at his daughter’s high school after the town auto factory shuts down.Lee is Eli, a popular high school junior and Mennonite farm boy, who is also a favorite on his mom’s Christian Instagram account.Warburton executive produces with Alloy Entertainment’s Leslie Morgenstein and Gina Girolamo.
Blitz directs and executive produces the pilot. Warner Bros. Television is the studio.Patel was recently cast in Sony Pictures’ live-action adaptation of Harold and the Purple Crayon, directed by Oscar nominee Carlos Saldanha.
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