Angela Bassett is keeping busy these days. The actress, better known for playing Athena Grant on the ABC drama 9-1-1 and Queen Ramonda of Wakanda in the Black Panther films has a new project up her sleeve. But does that mean Angela Bassett is leaving 9-1-1?
Is Angela Bassett Leaving 9-1-1?
Fear not, Angela Basset is going nowhere. Athena Grant will still be part of 9-1-1 in Season 8. Instead, the news involves something Bassett and her husband Courtney B. Vance are doing behind the scenes. Indeed, the pair are developing a cop drama for NBC produced by Universal TV. The drama will be set in Philadelphia.
As reported by Deadline, the duo will executive produce with producing partner Lynette Ramirez and writer Pilar Golden (God Friended Me, Beyond Black Beauty). The drama is titled Keats, and it “follows a fourth-generation police officer named Alex who, years after walking away from the job and her family, returns to Philadelphia for her mother’s funeral.”
The description also adds that “there, Alex comes to suspect that the death of her mother, a decorated officer, by suicide was something else altogether, and as she digs into the case, it leads her back toward her family on the police force.”
Both Bassett and Vance are plenty busy in front of the camera, as well. Vance can be seen on 61st Street and is set to appear in the Ryan Murphy series Grotesquerie. Bassett, meanwhile, stars in 9-1-1 alongside Peter Krause (Bobby Nash), Oliver Stark (Evan “Buck” Buckley), Alisha Hinds (Henrietta “Hen” Wilson), Kenneth Choi (Howard “Chimney” Han), Jennifer Love Hewitt (Maddie Buckley), Ryan Guzman (Edmundo “Eddie” Diaz) and Gavin McHugh (Christopher Diaz).
The show is ABC’s first responder drama that follows a group of firefighters and paramedics at the Los Angeles Fire Department’s fictional Station 118. Created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk, and Tim Minear, the procedural drama premiered in January 2018 and spawned the spin-off series 9-1-1: Lone Star. It aired its first six seasons on FOX before it was canceled by the network in May 2023 and picked up by ABC. 9-1-1 was then renewed for an eighth season in April 2024 after it became ABC’s most-watched current series across all platforms following its premiere on the network in March 2024.
