Those looking to find Cynthia Addai-Robinson on television need only to watch Arrow this Wednesday night, as the Spartacus star is set to reprise her role of Amanda Waller in "Suicide Squad." And it looks like she's lined up her next big project, as the actor is set to star in History's miniseries Texas Rising.
Deadline reports that Addai-Robinson has joined the cast of Texas Rising, an A+E Studios and ITV Studios America miniseries set up for History channel. The eight-hour miniseries will tell the story of the Texas revolution against Mexico and the rise of the legendary Texas Rangers. Addai-Robinson has signed on to play the mythic historical figure Emily West, who was later referred to as "The Yellow Rose of Texas." The character gets caught up in a love triangle with Bill Paxton's character Houston and Santa Ana, played by Oliver Martinez.
There are quite a few familiar faces already signed on for this hefty miniseries. Deadline reported earlier this month that Paxton was signed on to play Sam Houston, the father of Texas. Brendan Fraser is playing Billy Anderson, a Texas Ranger with Comanche Indian ties. Ray Liotta's on board as Lorca, an Alamo survivor looking for revenge. Jeffrey Dean Morgan is set to play Deaf Smith, "a deaf and grizzled veteran Texas Ranger with an advanced case of consumption." Meanwhile, Martinez is playing President General Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana, and Thomas Jane is playing James Wykoff, "a homesteader who finds himself living in the middle of hostile Indian territory. Also among the cast are Chad Michael Murray, Michael Rapaport and Max Thieriot.
Not sure if you were keeping count there, but that's a lot of dudes. Addai-Robinson's casting barely tilts the scale of the male-to-female ratio going on here, but it's a great bit of casting nonetheless. Her first big role on TV was probably the part of Debbie in the short-lived FlashForward, but she had a much longer and more memorable run on Starz's historical drama Spartacus, in which she took over the role of Naevia -- previously played by Lesley-Ann Brandt -- for Spartacus: Vengeance and the final season, Spartacus: War of the Damned. Since then, she's appeared in The Vampire Diaries and more recently, Arrow, in which she plays A.R.G.U.S. leader Amanda Waller. We've seen her gathering members of the Suicide Squad on the CW series, and tomorrow night, that arc is finally getting its own episode.
From Spartacus alone, we know Addai-Robinson can play emotional scenes as well as she can play a strong female character and a fierce fighter. Whether or not any or all of that proves useful for this Texas Rising role remains to be seen, but given how well some of History's other miniseries have performed, added to the eight-hour time frame, which suggests this project will air for a bit longer than just a two-night stretch, this could prove to be a big role for the actor's growing list of credits.
