Dennis Quaid has joined the cast of the Joe Exotic television series, joining Saturday Night Live star Kate McKinnon, who will play Carole Baskin, and John Cameron Mitchell, who will play Joe Exotic.
Also in the cast are Brian Van Holt who will play John Reinke, Sam Keeley who will play John Finlay and Nat Wolff who is stepping into the role of Travis Maldonado.
Quaid will take on the part of Rick Kirkham, who was the producer of everyone’s favourite lockdown guilty pleasure, Tiger King.
The TV series, which is being produced by NBC’s Peacock in the US, has been adapted from the Wondery podcast and follows the story of Carole Baskin — a big cat conservationist — who discovers that fellow exotic animal aficionado Joe “Exotic” Schreibvogel is breeding and using his big cats for profit. She sets out to shut down his venture, inciting a quickly escalating rivalry. However, Carole’s own checkered past comes back to haunt her as Joe is determined to use her secrets to expose her.
Netflix’s Tiger King — which was undoubtedly one of 2020’s most-watched show, having reached an audience of 34.3 million viewers in its first ten days on the streaming platform — has spawned not only the Peacock produced series, but a second scripted series from CBS Television Studios starring Nicholas Cage, a podcast, comic book and a documentary about Exotic’s traumatic past.
Exotic had also previously been featured in Louis Theroux’s BBC documentary America’s Most Dangerous Pets. In light of the Tiger King star’s transgressions, Theroux re-examined his old interviews for his new BBC film Shooting Joe Exotic.
Exotic is currently serving a 22-year prison sentence for allegedly attempting to hire someone to murder Baskin, in addition to animal abuse charges.
Baskin has gone on to appear on Dancing With the Stars, and announced in May 2021 that she had launched her own cryptocurrency, appropriately named $CAT, which, according to CNN, “allows fans to buy merchandise or online experiences from Baskin’s Big Cat Rescue animal sanctuary in Tampa, Florida, starting at five dollars.”
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