Zeeko Zaki has been cast in the lead role of Dick Wolf’s upcoming CBS drama “FBI,” Variety has confirmed.
The series will detail the inner workings of the New York office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Zaki will play FBI special agent OA, who made it from Bushwick to West Point, and has both the confidence and the will of someone who has had to fight every step of the way. After spending two years undercover, the DEA abruptly ripped him out, and he was cherry-picked by the FBI.
Zaki recently appeared in the CW drama “Valor” and the CBS drama “NCIS: Los Angeles.” His other credits include “24: Legacy” on Fox and the History Navy SEAL drama “Six.”
He is repped by Authentic Talent and Literary Management.
CBS gave the series a 13-episode order back in September. Shooting is slated to begin next spring on a pilot, with subsequent episodes set to film in the summer. The series is planned to premiere in the 2018-19 season. Wolf and Craig Turk will serve as executive producers with longtime Wolf collaborators Arthur W. Forney and Peter Jankowski. Universal Television, where Wolf is based, will produce the series with CBS Television Studios.
For Wolf, creator of the “Law & Order” and “Chicago” franchises for NBC, it is a further diversifying of his portfolio, following the serialized drama “Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders” on NBC and unscripted projects at Oxygen and A&E. For CBS, “F.B.I.” is the first series greenlit under CBS Entertainment president Kelly Kahl and senior executive VP of programming Thom Sherman, who took over as network programming chiefs in May with the departure of former president Glenn Geller.
