As GuideLive reported last week, a Marvel Television pilot helmed by X-Men director Bryan Singer will start shooting this month in Dallas. The show, operating under the work-in-progress title of Gifted, is shrouded in some mystery, but will reportedly follow a group of mutant teenagers and their parents as they flee an oppressive government–and its mutant-hunting robots–stringently opposed to the existence of X-people.
According to the Dallas Film Commission, open casting calls for extras on the pilot are now underway. Nothing quite as glamorous as “background mutant” here, but if you fit the bill for “high school students at dance,” “seedy types at bar,” or “Native Americans at outpost,” among other descriptors, this is your shot to be a part of the extended Marvel Universe.
This will be the second X-Men-related television venture after FX’s Legion, which premiered last month and has been getting rave reviews. Assuming the pilot gets picked up, and that it continues filming in Dallas, it could also become the second high-profile TV show presently in production in North Texas, following Queen of the South, the USA crime drama now shooting its second season.
Regardless, it’s a big get for the Dallas Film Commission, which is surely keeping a close eye on conservative lawmakers’ efforts in Austin to further gut the state’s film incentives program.
