The ‘Friday Night Lights’ and ‘Waco’ star joins a cast headed by Uzo Aduba and Matthew Broderick in the series.
Taylor Kitsch has joined the cast of Netflix’s opioid crisis drama Painkiller.

The Waco and Friday Night Lights star is one of eight actors to come aboard the series from showrunners Micah Fitzerman-Blue and Noah Harpster (A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood) and Narcos executive producer Eric Newman. John Ales, Sam Anderson, Carolina Bartczak, Jack Mulhern, Ana Cruz Kayne, Ron Lea and Tyler Ritter have also joined the series.

The show’s previously announced cast includes Uzo Aduba, Matthew Broderick, West Duchovny, Dina Shihabi and John Rothman.

Painkiller is a reunion for Kitsch and director and executive producer Peter Berg. The two worked together on Friday Night Lights and Battleship.

Painkiller will dramatize the origins of the opioid crisis with a focus on Oxycontin maker Purdue Pharma. The show is based on Patrick Radden Keefe’s New Yorker article “The Family That Built an Empire of Pain” and Barry Meier’s book Pain Killer: An Empire of Deceit and the Origin of America’s Opioid Epidemic.

Kitsch will play Glen Kryger, a hardworking family man whose life is upended when he suffers an injury. Ales (Euphoria) plays Gregory Fitzgibbons, a doctor in rural West Virginia. Anderson (Lost) plays Purdue Pharma co-owner Raymond Sackler. Bartczak (Most Dangerous Game) plays Glen’s wife, Lily Kryger. Mulhern (Mare of Easttown) will play Glen’s stepson, Tyler. Kayne plays Brianna Ortiz, an ambitious young attorney. Lea (Orphan Black) will play Bill Havens, a veteran lawyer. Ritter (Homecoming) plays U.S. Attorney John Brownlee.

Newman, who has an overall deal with Netflix, executive produces with Fitzerman-Blue and Harpster, Berg, Alex Gibney (The Crime of the Century) and Keefe. Meier is a consultant.

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