It’s been a long time coming but the original ‘Law & Order‘ is returning to the UK as 5USA announces a January premiere date for Season 21, the first revival season of the beloved US crime drama.
Dick Wolf’s ‘Law & Order’ has a unique bifurcated format of police procedural and legal drama and is known for its ripped-from-the-headline stories. Set and filmed in New York City, the first half is a murder investigation and apprehension of a suspect by NYPD detectives while the second half is the prosecution of the defendant by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.
‘Law & Order’ is the second longest-running drama series in the history of television. The original series premiered in 1990 and ran 20 seasons before being revived in 2022. Whilst Sky Witness has been running the spin-off series, ‘Law & Order: Organized Crime’ and ‘Law & Order: Special Victims Unit’, the revival of the original series has been conspicuously missing from the lineup. We don’t know the reason Sky didn’t manage to pick up the series. It could have been due to cost, it could have been due to an existing licensing deal (5USA do run older seasons of the ‘Law & Order’ shows), or it could be for some other reason. However, at least it does mean the original ‘Law & Order’ will now run somewhere on UK TV, even if it is going to be completely out of sync with its spin-off series.
The show stars original series actors Sam Waterson (‘The Newsroom’, ‘Grace & Frankie’), who played Jack McCoy for 16 Seasons in the original run, and Anthony Anderson (‘Black-ish’) who reprises his role as Detective Kevin Bernard which he previously played in Seasons 18 to 20. They are joined by Jeffrey Donovan (‘Burn Notice’) as Junior Detective Frank Cosgrove, Camryn Manheim (‘Ghost Whisperer’, ‘Person of Interest’) as Lieutenant Kate Dixon, Hugh Dancy (‘Hannibal’) as Executive Assistant District Attorney Nolan Price, and Odelya Halevi (‘Good Trouble’) as Assistant District Attorney Samantha Maroun.
Dick Wolf executive produces the series, with longtime collaborator Rick Eid (‘Law & Order’, ‘Law & Order: SVU’, ‘FBI’, ‘Chicago P.D.’) as writer and showrunner. Wolf Entertainment’s Arthur Forney and Peter Jankowski also exec produce with Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, producing the show in association with Wolf Entertainment.
‘Law & Order‘ Season 21 is set to premiere on Tuesday, 9th January 2024 at 9pm on 5USA in the UK.
