On the heels of its ratings and critical success, UNITED STATES OF TARA has been renewed for a second season, it was announced today by Showtime President of Entertainment Robert Greenblatt. The series, executive produced by Steven Spielberg, created by Diablo Cody and starring Academy Award®-nominated actress Toni Collette, focuses on a wife and mother struggling with dissociative identity disorder and the effect it has on her family. UNITED STATES OF TARA, a co-production of Showtime Networks and Dreamworks Television, also stars John Corbett and Rosemarie DeWitt. The series, which The San Francisco Chronicle described as having “provocative brilliance” and The Detroit News and Free Press called “a runaway hit,” will start production on the second season this summer and will be on the network with 12 new episodes in early 2010.
Said Greenblatt in making the announcement: “It has been pure pleasure working with Diablo Cody, Toni Collette, Steven Spielberg and everyone at Dreamworks on UNITED STATES OF TARA. This is a perfect fit for our premium brand and we’re thrilled that critics and audiences have responded to this groundbreaking show so well. I look forward to many more alternate personalities emerging from this unique series.
The series premiere week of UNITED STATES OF TARA reached 2.67 million subscribers, making it the network’s largest since 2004 and outperforming Showtime’s other hit series WEEDS, CALIFORNICATION, DEXTER, and THE TUDORS in their premiere weeks.
Academy Award®-winning screenwriter Diablo Cody (“Juno”), who wrote the pilot and several of the first season’s episodes, will continue to serve as a writer and one of the series executive producers along with Steven Spielberg, Justin Falvey and Darryl Frank of Dreamworks Television, and Alexa Junge. “We feel incredibly fortunate to have worked with Bob Greenblatt and his Showtime team on such a ground breaking project,” said Falvey and Frank. “From an original idea of Steven’s to working with Diablo Cody, Craig Gillespie, Alexa Junge, Toni Collette and the amazing cast we feel very proud to be part of this show and look forward to continuing this great collaboration in season 2. “
