Melinda Page Hamilton (Damnation, Devious Maids), Stefania LaVie Owen (The Carrie Diaries, Chance), Jane Adams (Twin Peaks, Hung), Sayyid El Alami, Fares Landousil & Wil Traval (Jessica Jones) have been cast as series regulars in Netflix's upcoming modern-day Jesus drama. Meanwhile Barbara Eve Harris, Iqbal Theba (Glee), Emily Kinney (The Walking Dead, Conviction), Jackson Hurst (Drop Dead Diva) and Nicole Rose Scimeca have been cast in recurring roles per Deadline's exclusive.
Messiah explores the lines among religion, faith and politics as told from multiple points of view. It chronicles the modern world’s reaction to al-Masih (Mehdi Dehbi), a man who first appears in the Middle East, creating a groundswell of followers around him claiming he is the Messiah. Is he sent from God, or is he a dangerous fraud bent on dismantling the world’s geopolitical order?
Adams plays Miriam Keneally, an acerbic CNN reporter who is doggedly devoted to unearthing the truth about al-Masih (Dehbi). In the process, she has to come to terms with some of her own personal secrets. Traval is Will Mathers, an Army veteran-turned-FBI JTTF agent who finds himself at loggerheads with his CIA counterpart Eva Geller (Michelle Monaghan) as they are thrown together in the pursuit of al-Masih.
El Alami plays Jibril Medina, an orphaned Syrian refugee who leaves war-torn Damascus to become a devotee of al-Masih in the hope the stranger leads him to his destiny. Landousil plays Samir, a Syrian refugee and friend to Jibril who also abandons Damascus, only to find that his destiny is elsewhere.
