Meet the Bluths (again): What you need to know as Arrested Development returns
The Bluths are back. Six years after Arrested Development’s original run, TV’s most eclectic family will return for a fourth season on May 26 with 15 new episodes, all available simultaneously on Netflix. Andrew Ryan catches up with the show’s cast
PORTIA DE ROSSI: Playing the scheming Lindsay was the last acting hurrah for Portia de Rossi. The Australian actress was a workhorse before AD, with multiple credits in film and TV and a four-year stint on Ally McBeal, but since the show wrapped in 2006, she’s been conspicuous by her absence. PORTIA DE ROSSI AS LINDSAY BLUTH FUNKE: Things can only improve for Lindsay in the new spate of episodes. In the season-three closer, she learned she was not actually Michael’s twin; in fact she wasn’t even a Bluth at all and was actually three years older than she believed.SAM URDANK/The Associated Press
JASON BATEMAN: A rare example of a former child star (remember The Hogan Family?) that made good, Bateman’s career has soared since playing Michael Bluth. Since 2006, Bateman has enjoyed top billing in more than two dozen feature films, most often comedies. JASON BATEMAN AS MICHAEL BLUTH: In the third-season wrap-up, Michael finally disengaged from the family business and was hugely relieved that all charges against his father were dropped. Expect season four to open with a nasty family reunion.Art Streiber
JEFFREY TAMBOR: At 68, the acting veteran continues to work steadily in both film and television. Most recently he appeared opposite Al Pacino in the HBO movie Phil Spector. JEFFREY TAMBOR AS GEORGE BLUTH SR.: The duplicitous Bluth family patriarch was finally cleared on all charges of treason and embezzlement (even though he was undeniably guilty of both). George was last spotted in the season closer, when he crashed son Michael’s vacation in Cabo San Lucas.Isabella Vosmikova
MICHAEL CERA Hailing from Brampton, Ont., Cera showed great promise post-AD, courtesy of well-received performances in films such as Juno, Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. The bad news was that he also appeared in such clunkers as the abysmal prehistoric-era comedy Year One. MICHAEL CERA AS GEORGE-MICHAEL BLUTH: Meek-mannered George-Michael was finally starting to assert himself in the sendoff and was rather nonplussed to discover that Maeby, the object of his adolescent desire, was not in fact his cousin.Joseph Viles
WILL ARNETT: The Toronto native has been hit and miss in his acting choices since attaining a modicum of fame playing the frustrated magician George Oscar Bluth, a.k.a. “Gob.” On screen, he has grinned through such stinkers as Blades of Glory, G-Force and The Rocker. Arnett is usually funnier in TV roles, whether in guest turns on 30 Rock or The Office, or starring in his own NBC sitcom Up All Night. WILL ARNETT AS GEORGE OSCAR BLUTH: At last check, Gob had seemingly abandoned his magician career and was content to live off the avails of the family fortune.PHIL McCARTEN/Reuters
TONY HALE: As the woebegone Buster, he was understandably needy and neurotic. How many TV characters have had their hand bitten off by a rogue seal? Hale has kept working since AD stopped shooting in 2006. Currently he’s a simpering personal aide in the HBO political comedy Veep. TONY HALE AS BUSTER BLUTH: Is this the end of Buster? When last seen, he was swept off the Queen Mary and cast into the roiling ocean waters–his second greatest fear. Buster’s first greatest fear comes when he comes face-to-face with his old seal nemesis.