Jake Gyllenhaal in ‘Presumed Innocent.’
The verdict is in on Presumed Innocent: Apple TV+ wants more.
The tech giant’s streaming service has ordered a second season of the legal drama based on Scott Turow’s best-selling novel. The renewal comes as the show’s eight-episode first season, which stars Jake Gyllenhaal as a prosecutor accused of murdering a colleague, is set to conclude on July 24.
Season two of Presumed Innocent will follow a new case. There’s no word yet on which (if any) members of the show’s current cast — which also features Ruth Negga, Bill Camp, O-T Fagbenle, Chase Infiniti, Elizabeth Marvel, Nana Mensah, Renate Reinsve, Peter Sarsgaard, Kingston Rumi Southwick and Gabby Beans — will return.
The show is Gyllenhaal’s first ongoing TV role, and he says he was drawn into the story “like an audience member” after reading the first script. He also said he enjoyed the challenge of working in a different medium after years of film and stage work.
“I had never been involved in a creative process like that, meaning not just the length of a show and that it was going to be eight hours but also that it was going to be revealed to me as we went along,” Gyllenhaal told THR. “I like the opportunity of different mediums. I like what it does, the questions it asks. As a performer, it’s so interesting to be in a different medium and see how it feels.”
Apple TV+ says Presumed Innocent is its most watched drama series to date (though as is usually the case with streaming platforms, it didn’t provide any viewing data). The show didn’t break into Nielsen’s U.S. streaming top 10 charts for its premiere week (June 10-16), the most recent week for which data is available.
The series is produced by J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions and David E. Kelley Productions in association with Warner Bros. TV, where Bad Robot has an overall deal.
Kelley adapted Turow’s novel (which was previously the basis for a 1990 feature film starring Harrison Ford) and serves as showrunner. Kelley and his DEK Productions partner Matthew Tinker executive produce with Abrams and Rachel Rusch Rich of Bad Robot, Gyllenhaal (via his Nine Stories) banner, Dustin Thomason, Sharr White, and directors Anne Sewitsky and Greg Yaitanes. Turow and Miki Johnson are co-EPs.
For season two, Kelley, Tinker, Abrams, Rich, Gyllenhaal and Thomason are all set to return as EPs, with Turow again serving as co-executive producer.
