Felicity Huffman RETURNS to TV for first time since college admissions scandal as she joins Criminal Minds: Evolution season 2
Felicity Huffman is making her return to TV for the first time since the college admissions scandal which saw her jailed in 2019.
The Desperate Housewives star, 61, who served 11 days in prison for fraud in 2019, will star in the second season of Criminal Minds spin-off Evolution.
Huffman will guest star as 'Dr. Jill Gideon, a brilliant biological psychiatrist, who agrees to help the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit investigate a murderous conspiracy theory.
Per a synopsis: 'Jill is reluctant to return to the bureau’s elite team given her complicated history with David Rossi (Joe Mantegna) and her dead ex-husband, Jason Gideon (previously played by original series star Mandy Patinkin), but soon realizes her specific skill set could help them uncover another clue to the elusive Gold Star mystery.'
She also recently starred in a revival of the Taylor Mac comedy play titled Hir at London's Park Theatre.
Felicity Huffman is making her return to TV for the first time since the college admissions scandal which saw her jailed in 2019 (pictured 2023)
Huffman will guest star as 'Dr. Jill Gideon, a brilliant biological psychiatrist, who agrees to help the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit investigate a murderous conspiracy theory'
'I did a pilot for ABC recently that didn't get picked up. It's been hard,' she told The Guardian.
'Sort of like your old life died and you died with it. I'm lucky enough to have a family and love and means, so I had a place to land.'
She was nominated for an Academy Award in 2006 for playing a trans woman in the drama Transamerica, a role she said she 'wouldn't be able to do now' amid the debate around authentic casting.
'I think we should reflect the audience and that's got to include everybody. There has been such inequity for so long and now the pendulum must swing the other way. But I hope it leads to a situation where anyone can play anything,' she said.
Felicity added in a statement to West End Theatre: 'I’m honoured to get to work with Steve Kunis and to perform at the Park Theatre.
'As an ardent fan of Taylor Mac I’m so thrilled I get to act in one of Taylor’s brilliant plays.
'I studied in London back in the palaeolithic era and it has been a dream of mine to come back here and work someday. I’m a lucky gal.'
Hir will run at the Park Theatre from February 15 until March 16.
In December last year, Felicity finally broke her silence on the scandal, saying she felt she had 'no option' but to break the law.
Felicity paid $30,000 in fines and spent 11 days in jail after being charged with fraud.
The Desperate Housewives star said she is 'still processing' after serving 11 days in prison for fraud in 2019, but recently starred in a revival of the Taylor Mac comedy play Hir (pictured at federal court in Boston in 2019)
The star played Lynette Scavo in Desperate Housewives which ran from 2004-2012
She had paid Rick Singer $15,000 to alter her daughter Sophia's SAT scores in order to land her a place at college and was among a group of wealthy, famous parents swept up in the scandal.
Actress Lori Loughlin was also jailed for paying for both her daughters to be accepted into USC.
In her first public remarks outside of the courtroom, Felicity told ABC that she thought it was 'a joke' when FBI agents turned up at her mansion to arrest her.
'They came into my home, they woke my daughters up at gunpoint - again, nothing new to the black and brown community - then they put my hands behind my back and handcuffed me.
'I asked if I could get dressed. I thought it was a hoax. I literally turned to one of the FBI people in a flak jacket and a gun and I go "is this a joke?"
Felicity said she regretted the scheme but felt she had no choice at the time because Sophia, who she previously said has a learning disability, would not have been accepted otherwise.
Now, Sophia is studying drama at Carnegie Mellon.
'It felt like I had to give my daughter a chance at a future. And so it was sort of like my daughter's future, which meant I had to break the law,' she said.
'I think I feel the people I owe a debt and an apology to is the academic community and to the students and the families that sacrifice and work really hard to get to where they are going legitimately.'
Felicity spoke to highlight A New Way of Life, an organisation that helps formerly incarcerated women reintegrate into society.
'I want to use my experience and what I've gone through and the pain to bring something good,' she said.
Huffman has opened up about how the Varsity Blues scandal has affected her, admitting it feels like her 'old life has died' in a new interview
Felicity with daughters Georgia (far left) and Sophia (second from left) and husband William H. Macy at the 2019 Golden Globes
Actress Lori Loughlin and her husband Mossimo Giuannulli were also arrested and spent time in jail
Felicity and her husband William H. Macy hired Singer to help Sophia improve her scores in order to get into college.
She claims the scheme was not obvious at first, but became plain when Singer told them Sophia would not be accepted into any schools without greasing the wheels.
'After a year, he started to say your daughter is not going to get into any of the colleges that she wants to.
'And I believed him. And so when he slowly started to present the criminal scheme, it seems like - and I know this seems crazy at the time - but that was my only option to give my daughter a future.
'And I know hindsight is 20/20 but it felt like I would be a bad mother if I didn't do it.
'So - I did it,' she said.
Sophia was unaware that her parents had paid for someone to alter her test answers after she completed the SATS.
The scheme involved Singer paying off a handful of discreet SAT test supervisors who would inflate students' scores once they had completed the exam.
Lori Loughlin had her daughters pose on rowing machines as part of their fraudulent applications in which they claimed to be star athletes
On the day of the SAT test, she said Sophia was nervous and asking if they could go for ice cream afterwards.
'She was going, 'Can we get ice cream afterwards?'" Huffman recalls. "I'm scared about the test.
'What can we do that's fun? And I kept thinking, turn around, just turn around. And to my undying shame, I didn't,' Huffman said.
Lori and husband Mossimo Giuliani had their daughters masquerade as sports stars, propping them up on rowing machines to fudge applications that presented them as athletes.
Rick Singer, the mastermind, was sentenced to three and a half years in prison in January of this year.
