'The Hot Zone' will see Julianna Margulies as an army scientist in yet another medical crisis show, after her iconic run in 'ER'
Julianna Margulies will be leading the National Geographic's 'The Hot Zone' mini-series, a role not far away from the medical genre in which she has already made her name.
‘The Hot Zone’ is set to premiere on National Geographic this coming Memorial Day, May 27, and Margulies will be leading the show as a US Army scientist, something similar to what we have seen her do in her long and successful stint in NBC’s TV series 'ER' — saving people's life.
Between 'ER' and the upcoming 'The Hot Zone', Margulies also worked in CBS' legal and political drama series, ‘The Good Wife.’ Although the two major series were strikingly different from each other, Margulies seems have taken a U-turn towards the medical genre, and this time with a more intense and true story of the debilitating virus entering US soil. The screenplay of 'The Hot Zone' has been adapted from the best-selling book of the same name by Richard Preston. The mini-series deals with the origin of one of the most catastrophic diseases the world has ever witnessed — Ebola.
Margulies acted as nurse manager Carol Hathway in 'ER' from 1994 to 2000 and was seen as a straight -forward but sensitive character. Her entry in the show is marked by a dubious suicide attempt over a failed affair with one of the doctors, which later rekindles in the show. Following her role as a nurse manager, Margulies took up the lead role as Alicia Florrick, a legal attorney in the critically acclaimed series 'The Good Wife'. Margulies was seen here as a sedate, disciplined woman, charting out her own course in troubled waters, while a public sex scandal involving her husband turned her world upside down.
From 'ER' to 'The Good Wife', Margulies has created her own niche, but this time with 'The Hot Zone', although the role attire might be similar, her creativity to tackle a lead as a scientist in a true story is worth looking out for. And although it is a mini-series it is the content of the plot that drove her to take up this challenging project. On being asked about 'The Hot Zone' in an interview with Deadline, Margulies says, "I took the job because of the story. I read the book, it was so riveting, and I loved the character. I also couldn’t believe that at the time I took the project it was 2018 and nothing much has changed."
Will 'The Hot Zone' win her equal or more accolades, we do not know, but the first look of the series will definitely give the chills, and the onus of the plot lies on her creative genius. Margulies already holds three Emmy's in her kitty — two from 'The Good Wife', and another from 'ER'.
While Margulies is not new to the jargons of the medical world, in the upcoming mini-series 'The Hot Zone', Margulies will enter a new place of sensitizing the audience, not just about Ebola, but also the work that the doctors, scientists, and other medical representatives played in handling the situation, during the crisis of 1989. While Preston's book which was released in 1994, by the same name, has a reputation of enthralling readers with graphic details, the National Geographic series has added various creative layers to deal with the plot.