Joe Exotic: NBCUniversal Orders Cross-Platform Series Starring Kate McKinnon

A new limited series on Joe Exotic is coming soon to NBCUniversal outlets. The limited series, which will star Kate McKinnon, will air on broadcast network NBC, cable channel USA Network, and the Peacock streaming service when it arrives. The TV show, based on the Over My Dead Body podcast and Netflix’s Tiger King docu-series, was ordered straight to series without a pilot. Etan Frankel will write the series and McKinnon will play big cat enthusiast Carole Baskin. No further casting has been announced.

NBC revealed more about the series in a press release.

NBCUNIVERSAL TELEVISION AND STREAMING PLACES CROSS-PLATFORM STRAIGHT-TO-SERIES ORDER FOR ‘JOE EXOTIC,’ STARRING KATE McKINNON
• NBCUniversal Television and Streaming announced straight-to-series order for UCP’s adaptation JOE EXOTIC (working title).

• The limited series event will roll out across NBCU’s scripted entertainment platforms – NBC, Peacock and USA.

• Etan Frankel (“Sorry for Your Loss,” “Shameless”) is set to pen the limited series via his overall deal with UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group.

• As previously announced, the series will star Emmy Award winner Kate McKinnon (“Saturday Night Live”), who will also executive produce.

• JOE EXOTIC is written and executive produced by Frankel. McKinnon will executive produce along with Wondery’s Hernan Lopez, Marshall Lewy and Aaron Hart.

• Based on the Wondery Podcast of the same name, JOE EXOTIC is a limited series based on true events following Carole Baskin (McKinnon), a big cat enthusiast, who learns that when fellow exotic animal lover Joe “Exotic” Schreibvogel is breeding and using his big cats for profit, she sets out to shut down his venture, inciting a quickly escalating rivalry. But Carole has a checkered past of her own and when the claws come out, Joe will stop at nothing to expose what he sees as her hypocrisy. The results prove dangerous.

• The role of Joe “Exotic” Schreibvogel has not yet been cast.

A premiere date for the series has not been revealed.

What do you think? Will you watch Joe Exotic when it arrives?

Personal life Kate McKinnon

McKinnon is a lesbian, and was previously in a romantic relationship with photographer and actress Jackie Abbott. While presenting an award to Ellen DeGeneres at the 77th Golden Globe Awards in 2020, McKinnon opened up about being gay and thanked DeGeneres for making it less scary for her to accept her sexual orientation while watching her TV sitcom, Ellen. While attending Columbia University, she dated future journalist Bari Weiss.

McKinnon has a cat, Nino Positano—named for a pizza restaurant where he was found—whom she jokingly refers to as her son. McKinnon’s love of cats has extended to her work: a lesbian cat adoption skit on SNL; voiceover work on PBS’ Nature Cat; and being cast in the big cat serial podcast as Carole Baskin. During the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic, SNL at Home used skits from the cast’s homes with McKinnon presenting a “bottom of the barrel” edition of “Whiskers R We” with Nino humorously disguised as all twenty adoptees.

She does not use social media, citing fear that she will “misrepresent her true feelings”