Phil Spector. Too Big To Fail. You Don’t Know Jack. Game Change. Recount. Don King: Only in America. Citizen Cohn. Indictment: The McMartin Trial, if you’re looking for a deep cut. Nothing says HBO like a TV movie based on a media circus—preferably a trial, even better if it’s political—that dominated the news cycle years ago.
The cable channel’s ongoing project to repackage CNN’s greatest hits will continue with Confirmation, which focuses on Anita Hill, the law professor who attracted national attention in 1991, when she testified that future Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas—then in the midst of contentious confirmation hearings—had sexually harassed her when they worked together in the early 1980s. Penned by Susannah Grant (Erin Brockovich, Ever After), the project has now taken the crucial first step every fact-based HBO production must take on its way being nominated for the Outstanding Television Movie Primetime Emmy: casting a lead actor who doesn’t really look like the person they’re playing.
Kerry Washington—currently on hiatus from wearing off-cream and drinking from cartoonishly large wine glasses on Scandal—will play Hill. No director has been confirmed, though The Hollywood Reporter says that the producers are eyeing Rick Famuyiwa, whose most recent film, Dope, played in the main competition of this year’s Sundance Film Festival. He also directed Our Family Wedding.