Report: Laverne Cox & Ava DuVernay Ready New CBS Pilots

Actress Laverne Cox and director/filmmaker Ava Duvernay are breaking respective new grounds on television with two new power moves to CBS.

While the Emmy-nominated actress, best known for her role on Netflix’s ‘Orange is the New Black,’ is set to be part of the “first series to feature a regular trans-character portrayed by a trans-actor on a prime-time show” on CBS, Duvernay is reporting a double win after being tapped to direct a series for the major network as well as an all new drama for OWN.

Get the deets inside:

Via Variety:

“Doubt [starring Cox] is a legal drama competing for a slot on CBS’s fall schedule and, if picked up, would be the first series to feature a regular trans character played by a trans actor on a prime-time show on that network. Cox, 30, was cast as Cameron Wirth, described by Variety as a defense attorney with an Ivy League education who is transgender and no stranger to having to fight for her rights.

She would be the second trans actress to regularly appear in a network series playing a trans character. Candis Cayne was the first, in ABC’s Dirty Sexy Money, which was canceled in 2008.”

Elsewhere in TV land:

Ava DuVernay has signed on to direct and exec produce CBS’ “For Justice” drama pilot…

…the pilot follows a female FBI agent working in the Criminal Section of the Department of Civil Rights Division who finds herself caught between her radical real family and her professional family.

The project, based on James Patterson’s novel “The Thomas Berryman Number,” also has Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal, James Patterson, Bill Robinson and Leopoldo Gout attached to exec produce with DuVernay and Balcer.

DuVernay is also creating an original television series for OWN with Oprah Winfrey, based on the novel “Queen Sugar.”