McShane Is King: Deadwood's Ian McShane will return to the small screen in the NBC pilot Kings, created by Heroes writer Michael Green. Show is described as a "contemporary soap opera, loosely based on the story of King David," which NBC optioned from God (repped by CAA's Kevin Huvane). [HR]

Nick Gunning for HSM: Back in 2006, Lion Share set up a little project at Nickelodeon called Spectacular!, and no one cared. That's because no one knew the TV movie was a high-school musical like, well, High School Musical. Robert Iscove will direct a cast of mostly unknowns including Zoey 101's Victoria Justice. Nickelodeon executives stress that songs will be performance-based, as opposed to "characters suddenly breaking into [idiotic] songs like in [that stupid] High School Musical [that we hate so much]." [HR]

Cadillac Picks Up Two More: Mos Def and Gabrielle Union have joined Adrien Brody and Beyoncé Knowles in Darnell Martin's Cadillac Records. Def will play rock-and-roll pioneer Chuck Berry in the story of Chess Records and the fifties music scene in Chicago. As everyone knows, in 1955 Berry found the new sound he'd been looking for when his cousin Marvin called him from Hill Valley High School's Enchantment Under the Sea Dance. [Variety]