Aman Goyal
Netflix’s ‘The Boroughs’ has fueled its star power with an Academy Award nominee! The Cinemaholic can reveal that Alfre Woodard has joined the cast of the mystery series. The show’s filming will start in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on September 9 and end on March 19, 2025. Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews serve as the project’s showrunners, with Ben Taylor on board as the director. Woodard will star alongside Geena Davis and Richard Gere in the series, which is backed by the Duffer brothers.
The show will consist of eight hour-long episodes, and the narrative unfolds as an original story about a retirement community living in the New Mexico desert. The peaceful existence of this group takes an unforeseen turn when an otherworldly species begins to leech off their time, posing a significant threat. As the stakes rise, an unlikely group of heroes emerges, determined to confront the danger and save their community.
With a career spanning nearly five decades, Woodard has excelled in every medium from stage to screen. She received an Academy Award nomination early in her career for her performance as Beatrice “Geechee” in ‘Cross Creek.’ The actress has won multiple Emmy Awards for her performances in various television projects, such as ‘The Practice,’ ‘Miss Evers’ Boys,’ ‘L.A. Law,’ and ‘Hill Street Blues.’
Woodard recently appeared in films such as ‘The Gray Man,’ ‘The Book of Clarence,’ and ‘Summer Camp.’ Currently, she voices Mimi in Disney Channel’s ‘Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur’ and is set to appear in Apple TV+’s forthcoming thriller series ‘The Last Frontier.’ Her upcoming projects include the film adaptation of Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot’ and Blair Underwood’s thriller ‘Viral.’
The retirement backdrop in ‘The Boroughs’ suggests a narrative involving an older generation taking on the villains, highlighted by the involvement of Gere and Davis. Gere’s last television role was in BBC’s ‘MotherFatherSon’ in 2019, in which he played the lead character, Max Finch. He has since kept a busy schedule with films like ‘Maybe I Do,’ Paul Schrader’s ‘Oh, Canada,’ and ‘Longing.’ Gere also awaits the premiere of his Paramount+ espionage show ‘The Agency,’ co-starring Michael Fassbender.
Davis, similarly, last appeared on television in 2019, playing Sandy Devereaux St. Clair in Netflix’s ‘Glow.’ The Academy Award-winning actress is gearing up for the upcoming release of Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut ‘Blink Twice.’
Addiss and Matthews are best known for developing Netflix’s ‘The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance,’ which won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Children’s Program. They also wrote the screenplay for the coming-of-age drama ‘Life in a Year’ and contributed to the upcoming anime film ‘The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim.’
The science fiction series is anticipated to follow in the footsteps of ‘Stranger Things,’ the Duffer brothers’ most successful project. While working on the final season of ‘Stranger Things,’ the siblings are also developing series adaptations of ‘Death Note‘ and Stephen King’s ‘The Talisman.’
Albuquerque’s sun-kissed atmosphere and cinematic history make it an ideal setting for ‘The Boroughs.’ The city has previously hosted the filming of ambitious projects such as ‘Stranger Things’ and ‘No Country for Old Men,’ the latter of which explored similar themes of humanity and aging. Additionally, the region is widely recognized as the production hub of AMC’s ‘Breaking Bad‘ and ‘Better Call Saul.’
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