Hulu’s “The Dropout” will go on without Kate McKinnon, who was chosen to star and produce the story of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes and her dramatic fall from grace.
The limited drama series will now seek to cast a new actor to play the entrepreneur before the production starts planned for the summer.
The series is based on ABC Radio and the ABC News podcast about the unfortunate inventor, who left Stanford to found Theranos. The company invented the Edison machine, a diagnostic tool that promised an easy way to test 200 diseases. But the machine did not work as she said, although it attracted wealthy investors, including Betsy DeVos and Rupert Murdoch.
The company has been valued at $ 9 billion and Theranos became one of the richest women in the world before being indicted by a federal jury in 2018 on nine charges of electronic fraud and two charges of conspiracy to commit electronic fraud.
Podcast host Rebecca Jarvis will serve as executive producer, and podcast producers Victoria Thompson and Taylor Dunn will also serve as EPs.
Several Elizabeth Holmes projects were announced after her indictment, including “Bad Blood”, based on the book of the same name, with Adam McKay directing a film starring Jennifer Lawrence.
In addition to his ongoing show on “Saturday Night Live,” McKinnon will star as the owner of the tiger sanctuary Carole Baskin in “Joe Exotic”, a limited series about the infamous tiger king, which airs on NBC, Peacock and USA Network.
Deadline first reported McKinnon’s departure from the project.