David Farnor | On 04, Sep 2015

Mahershala Ali has joined the cast of Netflix’s Luke Cage.

Ali will play Cornell “Cottonmouth” Stokes, the owner of a nightclub in Harlem who becomes an unexpected villain for the hero-for-hire thanks to his criminal activities.

The actor is no stranger to the streaming world, thanks to his frequently scene-stealing turn as Remy Danton in Netflix’s House of Cards, with Executive Producer/Head of Marvel Television Jeph Loeb promising that the super hero show will allow him to “really let loose”.

“Mahershala is an actor of extraordinary range and gravitas,” added Loeb. “Luke Cage won’t know what hit him.”

Ali joins an ever-expanding ensemble for the new Marvel series, which already includes Sons of Anarcy’s Theo Rossi, Daredevil’s Rosario Dawson (reprising his role as Claire Temple) and, if rumours turn out to be true, True Blood’s Alfre Woodard. Marvel, though, has only officially announced the casting of one other character in the series: Mike Colter as the charismatic lead, a wrongly accused man who obtains super strength after a sabotaged experiment and escapes prison.

The series is the next step in Netflix’s gradually-building world of Hell’s Kitchen superheroes, following Marvel’s Daredevil and (coming soon) Jessica Jones, in which Cage will make his first appearance.

The series’ showrunner is Ray Donovan’s Cheo Hodari Coker and will premiere in 2016.

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