Donald Faison & Abigail Spencer To Star In Mike O’Malley’s NBC Comedy Pilot

EXCLUSIVE: Donald Faison and Abigail Spencer are set as the co-leads opposite Jon Cryer in Mike O’Malley’s off-cycle multi-cam NBC comedy pilot from Lionsgate Television.

Written by Survivor’s Remorse creator O’Malley, the untitled comedy centers on Jim (Cryer) and Julia (Spencer) who, after an amicable divorce, decide to continue to raise their two young kids at the family home while taking turns on who gets to stay with them. Navigating the waters of divorce and child-sharing gets hilariously more complicated for Jim when the owner of his favorite sports team (Faison) enters the picture and wins Julia’s heart.

Faison plays Trey, owner of the Boston Celtics, a proud MIT grad and Julia’s new fiancé. Spencer’s Julia is the successful owner of her own crisis management firm.

Cryer was previously cast as Jim, a good-natured, sarcastic yet sincere corporate compliance officer who gets along famously with everyone including Julia, with whom he shares a close bond characterized by lots of laughter and warm feelings.

O’Malley executive produces with The Conners EP Tom Werner, who also owns the Boston Red Sox; Boston Celtics majority owner Wyc Grousbeck and his wife, Emilia Fazzalari; and George Geyer. Lionsgate Television is the studio.

Faison, best known for playing Turk on NBC hit comedy series Scrubs, recently was seen on Legends of Tomorrow and previously starred on NBC’s Emergence. He also created/showruns/voices the lead of the stop-motion Adult Swim series Alabama Jackson. He’s repped by UTA and Fuller Law.

Mad Men alumna Spencer, who recently recurred on the 18th season of Grey’s Anatomy, also co-starred in Sundance TV’s Rectify, for which she earned a Critics Choice nomination for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series, and in NBC’s Timeless. She is repped by UTA, Untitled Entertainment and Hansen Jacobsen.