Lady Bird’s Jake McDorman to Play Murphy Brown’s Son

Photo: Michael Kovac/Getty Images for GQ

Murphy Brown’s very famous baby is all grown up, and he looks a lot like  Lady Bird and Limitless star Jake McDorman. Vulture has learned that the 31-year-old actor has snagged the role of Avery Brown, the 26-year-old son of Candice Bergen’s titular character on the classic CBS sitcom. The Eye is reviving creator Diane English’s late-1980s, early-1990s comedy, reuniting all of the main surviving cast for a 13-week return set to begin production in August for a likely fall return. According to CBS, McDorman’s Avery is now a “millennial journalist son who is following in his mother’s footsteps, perhaps too closely, and has his mother’s competitive spirit and quick wit.” Die-hard Murphy fans will recall that the last actor to play Avery was Haley Joel Osment, who played a school-age version of the character. Meanwhile, CBS is adding  some more millennial magic to Murphy Brown with the casting of Nik Dodani (Atypical), who will play the social-media director for Murphy’s newsmagazine, “tasked with bringing Murphy and the gang into the 21st century,” per CBS. We assume this means at least one episode will now involve Murphy accidentally sending a tweet.