Apple TV+ has reunited the team behind Black Bird for the upcoming new series Smoke, with the added perk of Jurnee Smollett returning to TV to co-lead opposite Taron Egerton. While the 2025 TV schedule series won't be Smollett's first venture since HBO's Lovecraft Country was cancelled back in 2021, Detective Michelle Calderone will be the actress' first series regular role in years. She spoke with CinemaBlend ahead of Smoke's premiere on June 27 to explain what the new project had that brought her back to the small screen for her biggest role since Lovecraft Country.
Smoke is inspired by the Firebug podcast, with Black Bird's Dennis Lehane creating and writing the new show for anybody to watch with an Apple TV+ subscription. The action centers on arson investigator David Gudsen (Taron Egerton) and Detective Michelle Calderone (Smollett) joining forces to try and take down two arsonists. Suffice it to say that there are twists on the way as episodes release weekly, and nobody will be confusing Smollett's performance as Michelle with her work as Leti on Lovecraft Country.
So, why return to a series regular role for Smoke, when she spent the majority of the years since Lovecraft Country working on films? I asked Jurnee Smollett that very question during Apple TV+'s press junket for Smoke, and she shared:
That's a great question. I mean, I think I've been fortunate to work with some really incredible story makers and actors in this time period. The Burial with Jamie Foxx and working with Allison Janney on Lou, and Justin Kurzel and Jude Law [on The Order], it wasn't about, should it be film, or should it be TV? It was just about the project and the folks involved. And when I was sent this project, I'm such a fan of Dennis Lehane, his writing. Mystic River, Live By Night, Shutter Island. You know, classics.
Smollett wasn't picking and choosing projects based on whether they were film or TV, so working mostly on movies in recent years wasn't a direct reaction to the sting of Lovecraft Country's cancellation. She was also not the only Smoke cast member to express admiration for Dennis Lehane during the junket, although she was the only one to list his "classics" that made her such a fan.
Black Bird was certainly a thrilling addition to Dennis Lehane's list of credits back in 2022, and Jurnee Smollett went on to share the specifics of Smoke that really attracted her to the series. She said:
No one does the crime thriller better than Dennis Lehane, and one of the things he does so well is he's capable of writing within that genre these really complex characters, and this dynamic of Michelle and Dave felt so rich, and Michelle was just someone I knew I had to play because, like you said, she was just so demanding. So I'm looking for those kinds of challenges as an actor to really play with all those different layers.
I won't get into Smoke spoilers here, but I can say that there are certainly layers to several characters to prevent them from being qualified as all good guys or all bad guys. It's also clear from the trailer alone that Jurnee Smollett's Michelle and Taron Egerton's Dave are going to have a complicated dynamic. Take a look:
In addition to Jurnee Smollett and Taron Egerton, Smoke stars Rafe Spall, Greg Kinnear, John Leguizamo, Ntare Mwine, and Anna Chlumsky, among others. Like Egerton, this series will be a repeat collaboration with Dennis Lehane for Greg Kinnear, who was part of the Black Bird cast.
Fortunately, the wait to check out Smollett and Egerton as co-leads is nearly over, as Smoke premieres the first two episodes of the season on Friday, June 27. Like Jensen Ackles' Countdown on Amazon Prime as one of the week's other biggest premieres, episodes will continue to release weekly on Apple TV+ following the doubleheader pair of premiere episodes.
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