\t\u201cCross\u201d star Aldis Hodge told Buzzfeed that he was \u201cshocked\u201d when it was recently revealed that author James Patterson turned down a seven-figure deal offer to turn his book character, police detective Alex Cross, into a white man when he was originally shopping the first book around. Hodge now plays the character in Prime Video\u2019s series adaptation of Patterson\u2019s book series.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI was shocked, impressed and proud of that,\u201d Hodge said of Patterson\u2019s reveal. \u201cFor me to step into these shoes, any time I step into a position of power or representation, it feels like a privilege and a responsibility that I\u2019m honored to even be tasked with. I just want to carry that the right way.\u201d \t<\/p>\n
\tHodge also credited his \u201cCross\u201d showrunner Ben Watkins for \u201ccelebrating all of the assets and facets of the Black community\u201d on the show \u201cin different ways that we haven\u2019t really seen, or that we rarely get to engage [with].\u201d <\/p>\n
\t\t\t \t\t\tPopular on Variety\t\t \t \t\t \t \t\u201cHe made that the fabric of the show,\u201d the actor added. \u201cI\u2019m proud to be with a team that believes in the same values that I do, especially when it comes to the representation of the culture. Stepping in his shoes is just another opportunity to disprove stereotypes, represent the truth of who we are and help continue to open up doors of opportunity. That\u2019s what it means to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cCross\u201d dropped all eight episodes of its first season on Nov. 14. Amazon Prime Video reported earlier this month that 40 million viewers watched \u201cCross\u201d during its first 20 days of streaming availability, which makes the show its third-biggest season premiere of 2024 after \u201cFallout\u201d Season 1 and \u201cThe Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power\u201d Season 2.<\/p>\n
\tPatterson was speaking to The Hollywood Reporter in November when he revealed that a seven-figure offer wasn\u2019t going to persuade him to turn Alex Cross into a white man. As the author explained: \u201cI said, \u2018Fuck you.\u2019 It was painful, but I did it.\u201d Patterson added that he didn\u2019t want to make Cross white because \u201cthat wasn\u2019t who he was.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tPrime Video\u2019s \u201cCross\u201d has already been renewed for Season 2. The first season is now streaming.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cCross\u201d star Aldis Hodge told Buzzfeed that he was \u201cshocked\u201d when it was recently revealed that author James Patterson turned down a seven-figure deal offer to turn his book character, police detective Alex Cross, into a white man when he was originally shopping the first book around. Hodge now plays the character in Prime Video\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":21535,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tv-series"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieetv.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}