Netflix's 'The Baby-Sitters Club' Reboot Casts Alicia Silverstone And Mark Feuerstein (As Parents)
Netflix's ten-episode reboot of The Baby-Sitters Club has found its first two cast members.
Alicia Silverstone (Clueless) and Mark Feuerstein (Royal Pains) have joined the cast, not as babysitters – that would be supremely weird – but as parents. Read on to learn more about their characters and what we know about the show so far.The Baby-Sitters Club, based on Ann M. Martin's beloved book series, follows girls named Kristy Thomas, Mary Anne Spier, Claudia Kishi, Stacey McGill, and Dawn Schafer as they form the eponymous club, and this contemporary series plans to "reflect modern-day issues." Deadline reports that Silverstone will be playing Elizabeth Thomas-Brewer, Kristy Thomas's mother and the love interest of Feuerstein's Watson Brewer. (Brewer is Kristy's stepfather; in the books, her biological father walked out on his family when Kristy was six years old.)
Silverstone was everywhere in the 1990s, but her career cooled off a bit in the 2000s. She seems to be making a comeback, though: she recently appeared in The Killing of a Sacred Deer and Book Club, last year she headlined the original series American Woman, and she also stars in the upcoming horror film The Lodge, which /Film's Chris Evangelista saw at Sundance and loved. Feuerstein appeared on over 100 episodes of Royal Pains; created, executive produced and starred in the CBS comedy 9JKL; and recently played himself on both BoJack Horseman and Better Things.
Weird trivia: this won't be the only babysitter-related credit on their IMDb pages, though. Silverstone starred in a 1995 thriller called The Babysitter, and earlier this year, Feuerstein co-starred in a comedy called Babysplitters. (Close enough.)
Like the source material on which it's based, the new Netflix show will track the "friendship and babysitting adventures of five best friends" who live in the fictional town of Stoneybrook, Connecticut. And in keeping with the young adult novels, the 1995 movie, and the first live-action TV series adaptation, this version of The Baby-Sitters Club is intended to be family-friendly.
Rachel Shukert (GLOW) will serve as showrunner and Lucia Aniello (Broad City) will serve as director and executive producer for the Walden Media-produced series, and Michael De Luca (The Social Network, Captain Phillips, Moneyball) is on board to executive produce.Melissa Cobb, the vice president of Kids & Family content at Netflix, previously said, "The themes of The Baby-Sitters Club still resonate 30 years after the original book series was released and there has never been a more opportune time to tell an aspirational story about empowering young female entrepreneurs. Together with Ann M. Martin and the team at Walden Media, our ambition is to contemporize the storylines and adventures of this iconic group of girlfriends to reflect modern-day issues."