No, 'Prime Suspect' Should Not Be Remade By NBC. Too Late. Now, Who To Cast As Lead?

I've used up my week's worth of crankiness having to rid my screen of the names Charlie Sheen, Justin Bieber, LIndsay Lohan, Harry's Law, American Idol and so on. There's only so much soul crushing link-clicking that one person can take (or try to avoid).

And then there came word that NBC gave the green light to formerly junked, formerly green-lit dramatic series Prime Suspect, the British series starring Helen Mirren that is, arguably, in the upper pantheon of best televisions series ever made.  Now, I have a feeling Robert Greenblatt, aka Yes, I Can Make That Work, was momentarily distracted from the world's largest reclamation project, aka NBC, and looked at the astonishingly wrong-headed idea to remake Prime Suspect and thought, "Wait just a minute. I think I can make that work. Let's stay positive. Go with it." 

Which is, as all Prime Suspect fans must agree, counterintuitive to both sanity and taste. Yes, the naysayers will jump out and rub the American remake of The Office in all of our sour, doubting mugs. And they will be right about that. But they will be wrong about the likelihood that NBC will be afforded two miracles. For the record, I could not have been more against the NBC remake of The Office. Not long after that, I could not have been more wrong, period. The show worked. They kept the spirit and made it their own, which is probably the hopeful mantra of the people behind Prime Suspect.

But if NBC is looking at Maria Bello to star as Jane Tennison, well, we've got problems. She's too young. She's too pretty. She doesn't have enough gravitas. Kathy Bates would have been a fine choice, but she's already in Harry's Law, a woefully bad series which the TV Gods made a hit just to torture me. So she's out.

Who would be the best actress to put in the role? Well, Greenblatt winnowed the herd by hiring a whole bunch of excellent choices for his various series at Showtime - Edie Falco in particular. If there was one actress I would pick for that role, it would be Falco. But of course, I'd want that version to be on Showtime or HBO or FX. Not on NBC.

But before I digress into a rant about why remaking Prime Suspect is the kind of notion that makes me fall on the ground like I'd been struck by a sniper, let's just focus on the casting of the pilot. It may never get picked up. It may be awful when it gets picked up. But if it has any chance at all, getting Jane Tennison right is essential. So, who should get the role?