Scarlett Johansson Makes TV Debut In Prime Video's Just Cause Remake

Scarlett Johansson is about to make her debut as a lead actor in a TV drama, when a new crime thriller she’s fronting gets released on Prime Video. Until now, Johansson has been acting almost exclusively on the big screen, and is yet to appear on television in a leading dramatic role.

Following in the footsteps of various other A-list movie stars from her generation, however, Johansson is finally making the jump over to TV with Prime Video’s remake of Just Cause. She’s also serving as an executive producer on the project, which is currently being developed by I Am Not Okay with This co-creator Christy Hall.

Some of Scarlett Johansson’s best movie roles have been in crime thrillers, from Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige to the all-action sci-fi blockbuster Lucy. She’s well versed in the genre, then, and feels like an ideal candidate to play Just Cause’s gender-swapped antihero, Madi Cowart.

This Prime Video series will also be the second time she’s played a reporter investigating a murder, too, after her turn in the 2006 mystery comedy Scoop. Johansson’s collaborators on the show will include American Fiction’s writer-director Cord Jefferson and The West Wing’s showrunner John Wells.

With key creatives like these at the helm, Just Cause has every chance of becoming one of Prime Video’s best thriller TV shows. Curiously, it won’t be the first adaptation of John Katzenbach’s bestselling novel that Scarlett Johansson has featured in, either. Just Cause was one of the first movies she ever acted in, way back in 1995.

Scarlett Johansson Will Star In Prime Video's Just Cause Remake

Prime Video’s Just Cause represents a landmark moment in Scarlett Johansson’s career, as the first TV drama she’s ever been a major part of. In fact, it’s the only small-screen drama the actor has been involved in at all, if we discount her minor appearance in the legal-procedural series The Client as a child, and her celebrity cameo in Entourage.

The recent streaming success of Johansson’s movie Lucy on Netflix proves she’s as popular as ever among viewers, suggesting that now is the perfect time for her to cross over into television. What’s more, she’s been heavily involved in developing Just Cause for Prime Video from the very beginning.

Her company These Pictures is co-producing the series, and Johansson is the only actor officially attached to the project at this time. Since it’s still in development, Just Cause is likely looking at a release in 2027 or 2028.

Johansson Also Starred In The Movie Just Cause As A Child Actor

The most incredible thing about Scarlett Johansson’s starring role in Prime Video’s Just Cause is that this show is actually a remake of the 1995 movie in which Johansson got one of her very first breaks as an actor. At 10 years old, she played Katie Armstrong, the daughter of Sean Connery’s protagonist, which was just her second screen role.

This iteration of Just Cause is a nineties thriller movie rightly overlooked for lackluster storytelling and unconvincing climax. Nevertheless, it forms one half of a remarkable coincidence, as Scarlett Johansson will be repeating history by making her TV debut telling the same story as the one her 10-year-old self was part of, 31 years ago.

Johansson will even be playing the Sean Connery character who served as her father in the movie version, as she’s long since graduated to top billing for virtually everything she’s in. No doubt, she’ll be experiencing a profound sense of déjà vu on the set of Prime Video’s Just Cause.

Prime Video's Just Cause Will Be Very Different From The Movie

Just Cause is just one of several unmissable upcoming shows on Prime Video which are reboots of a previous release. Carrie and Tomb Raider will be the remakes taking center stage in 2026, but it will be the turn of Scarlett Johansson’s show not long after.

Yet, those expecting this adaptation of John Katzenbach novel to be anything like the 1995 movie are sorely mistaken. This TV version of Just Cause will be far more faithful to its literary source material, with Johansson playing a gender-swapped version of the book’s protagonist, Florida reporter Madison "Madi" Cowart, who’s investigating a death-row inmate’s apparent innocence.