Emmy Award-Winning Bryan Cranston Gets a Web Series

Forget, for a moment, his three consecutive Emmy Award wins for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series.

Any individual with the ability to play a modern-day Mr. Wilson father figure with a heart of gold in a zany live-action comedy for seven years, and then take on the role of a conflicted, morally ambiguous terminal lung cancer patient with a helluva mind and nothing to lose for three seasons and counting must be a fantastic actor.

Now, remember all those awards and accolades and you know Bryan Cranston is outstanding. That’s why I’m super jazzed he’s bringing his talents to the web.

Cranston broke the news in an interview with Sandra Gonzalez at Entertainment Weekly he’s staring in an upcoming web series for Comedy Central’s Atom.

The Handlers is an Americanized version of the French short film Henaut President. It tells the story of an “ambitious group of campaign operatives determined to claw their way to the top of their game and do whatever it takes to get a hapless candidate elected to a post as State Senator, whether he likes it or not.”

Cranston saw the French original and asked friend and director Jamie Bruce to help bring the concept stateside. Cranston and Bruce pitched The Handlers to Avalon Television and Avalon pitched it to Atom.

After reading the series’ boilerplate and watching a few minutes of the French original with no comprehension of Romance languages, it looks like The Handlers will be The Office meets a small town Spin City with a ragtag cast of inept, James Carville wannabes.

The Handlers is produced by 50/50 Productions. The first of eight or so weekly episodes will debut on Tuesday, January 4 at Atom.com.