Round-Up: Angela Bassett Joins American Horror Story: Hotel, Casting Update for Hap and Leonard

Angela Bassett has checked into American Horror Story: Hotel, the awesome role of Hap Collins has been cast for the highly anticipated Hap and Leonard SundanceTV series.

American Horror Story: Hotel: Ryan Murphy revealed on Twitter today that Angela Bassett will play a role in FX's American Horror Story: Hotel. Bassett, who played Marie Laveau in American Horror Story: Coven and Desiree Dupree in American Horror Story: Freak Show, joins a growing Hotel cast that includes Lady Gaga, Kathy Bates, Sarah Paulson, Matt Bomer, Cheyenne Jackson, Wes Bentley, Evan Peters, and Chloë Sevigny.

In October, Angela Bassett will be making lots of trouble with Lady Gaga in the ballroom and elsewhere. #ahshotel

— Ryan Murphy (@MrRPMurphy) April 30, 2015

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Hap and Leonard: Variety reports that James Purefoy (The Following) has been cast as Hap Collins in the upcoming six-episode season of SundanceTV's new series, Hap and Leonard, based on the books by Joe R. Lansdale, which are a brilliant blend of humor, horror, thrills, mystery, martial arts, and much more.

"Hap spent time in prison for refusing to be drafted and serve in the Vietnam War. Now in his 30s, he works on a plantation picking roses with little financial means, but still has Leonard, his lifelong best friend and confidant. An openly gay black Vietnam war vet, Leonard struggles with anger issues and was raised by his homophobic uncle, causing him to lean on Hap for support in the non-progressive rural South of the 1980s."

Purefoy joins a cast that includes Michael Kenneth Williams (whom many remember as Omar Little from The Wire) as Leonard Pine, Bill Sage as Howard, and Jimmi Simpson as Soldier.

The Hap and Leonard series is co-written and at least partly directed by Jim Mickle (who co-wrote and directed last year's Cold and July, based on Lansdale's novel of the same name). Nick Damici (Late Phases: Night of the Lone Wolf, Stake Land) lends his pen to the script and both will serve as executive producers. E.L. “Evan” Katz, who directed Cheap Thrills, is also writing and producing the series.

Filming on Hap and Leonard begins this year, with Lansdale himself co-executive producing the project. The series is expected to debut in 2016 and looks as if it will follow the first novel of the Hap and Leonard books, 1990's Savage Season. For those unfamiliar with Savage Season, here's the synopsis:

"Start with two best friends who practice martial arts in their free time: one a straight white guy, the other a black gay guy. Add a conniving ex-wife in a blue-jean miniskirt. Throw in half a million in a muddy creekbed somewhere near the Sabine River in East Texas. Add an ex-radical from the '60s and two naive idealists who want to save the world. Mix them all together in a half-assed plan, season with double-crosses, and then top it off with a hilarious and chilling drug dealer named Soldier. Bloody mayhem a la Lansdale."