CBS has announced that their new drama The Equalizer, a reboot of the classic series starring Academy Award nominee and multi-hyphenate Queen Latifah, will be broadcast immediately following CBS Sports’ broadcast of Super Bowl LV on Sunday, February 7, 2021. The episode will air at 10 PM ET (time is approximate after post-game coverage) and will then move to its regular Sunday time period on February 14, 2021 at 8 PM ET. Kelly Kahl, President, CBS Entertainment said in a statement: “The Super Bowl and the AFC Championship Game in primetime is the ultimate combination to promote and showcase an episode of a highly anticipated new series, a rising procedural drama and our acclaimed late night franchises.”
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A reimagining of the series with Queen Latifah starring as Robyn McCall, an enigmatic woman with a mysterious background who uses her extensive skills to help those with nowhere else to turn. She’s joined in the cast by Chris Noth as William Bishop, Lorraine Toussaint as Viola “Aunt Vi” Marsette, Tory Kittles as Det. Marcus Dante, Adam Goldberg as Harry Keshegian, Liza Lapira as Melody Bayani and Laya DeLeon Hayes as Delilah.
Andrew Marlowe, Terri Miller, Dana Owens (Queen Latifah), John Davis, John Fox, Debra Martin Chase, Richard Lindheim (co-creator of the original “Equalizer” TV series that ran on CBS for four seasons), and Shakim Compere are executive producers. Liz Friedlander (American Horror Story, The Boys) directed the pilot episode.
Davis and Fox of Davis Entertainment have previously found success on television with TV series reboots, having previously shepherded Magnum P.I. for CBS with Jay Hernandez in the role made famous by Tom Selleck, as well as last year’s Shaft that starred Samuel L. Jackson alongside Jessie T. Usher and Richard Roundtree.
The actress joins an exclusive club of Equalizers with the original version of ex-covert operations officer Robert McCall being played by Edward Woodward on television with Denzel Washington playing the role on the big screen in the two Equalizer movies, marking the first time that Washington ever appeared in a sequel to one of his movies. The two films, released in 2014 and 2018 respectively, went on to gross over $190 million worldwide each with minimal drop off between the two. Coincidentally, Latifah interviewed Washington on her short lived TV series for the first film in 2014.
Episodes of the original Equalizer are available to stream on NBC.com, the two films are available to rent or own on all major movie platforms.
