Jeff Daniels Starring In New Apple TV+ Series Inspired By Memoir About Media World

Jeff Daniels is starring in a new Apple TV+ series inspired by a memoir about the media world. Though Daniels is perhaps best known for the screwball comedy Dumb and Dumber, he's also highly adept at delivering dramatic performances, starting his career with Terms of Endearment in 1983 and going on to star in The Purple Rose of Cairo, Something Wild, and The Squid and the Whale. He's also won an Emmy Award for playing the anchor Will McAvoy in Aaron Sorkin's HBO series The Newsroom.

Now, the Emmy-winning actor will be returning to television. According to Deadline, Daniels will star in the Apple TV+ series Dilettante based on Dana Brown's memoir about working for former Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter. Daniels will play a fictionalized magazine editor based on Carter. The series is written by Brown and Daniel Goldfarb, the creator of Max's Julia, and is described as a "fictionalized coming-of-age story set in the glamorous and cutthroat Golden Age of magazines in 1990s New York."

What Jeff Daniels Starring In Dilettante Means For The Show

What To Expect From His Character

In Dilettante, Daniels will play a fictionalized magazine editor based on Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, much like how Meryl Streep's fictionalized magazine editorMiranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada is believed to be based on Vogue editor-in-chiefAnna Wintour, for whom the novel's author, Lauren Weisberger, had worked as a personal assistant, basing the character of Andrea Sachs (played by Anne Hathaway in the movie) on herself. Similarly, Dana Brown was an assistant to Carter, and later rose to deputy editor of Condé Nast magazine.

In his memoir, Dilettante: True Tales of Excess, Triumph, and Disaster, Brown recounts his journey to becoming one of Carter's most trusted confidantes, attending glamorous media events like the Oscars and encountering notable figures such as Anna Wintour, Seth Rogen, and Caitlyn Jenner. When his memoir was originally optioned for television, Brown compared the potential series to Suits combined with the cutthroat drama of Succession, though he admitted he had never actually seen the USA legal drama.

Our Take On Jeff Daniels Starring In Dilettante

It Won't Be The First Fictional Character Based On Graydon Carter

In Dilettante, Daniels actually won't be playing the first fictional character based on Graydon Carter. In the 2008 film How to Lose Friends & Alienate People, Jeff Bridges played a magazine editor, Clayton Harding, who was loosely based on Carter. Daniels should be able to deliver a performance that feels distinct by emphasizing Carter's charisma, self-assuredness, and showmanship, rather than creating a caricature. Jeff Daniels won an Emmy for playing a fictionalized media figure, news anchor Will McAvoy, by making him feel like a real-life figure, so he should be able to do it again in Dilettante.

Source: Deadline