The Watchful Eye, a mystery drama from Ryan Seacrest, debuts on Freeform Monday, January 30. The show follows Elena, a young woman with what Freeform calls “a complicated past,” who is a nanny for an affluent family in Manhattan. “She quickly learns that everyone in the mysterious building has deadly secrets and ulterior motives. What they don't know, however, is that Elena has some shocking secrets of her own,” Freeform said.
Two episodes air on premiere night, and all 10 are on Hulu January 31.
Mariel Molino, Warren Christie, Amy Acker, Jon Ecker, Aliyah Royale and Lex Lumpkin are in the cast.
Seacrest executive produces with Emily Fox, Nina Wass, Andrea Shay and Jeffrey Reiner. Fox is the showrunner. Julie Durk created the show and is a consultant on it.
Fox likened the series to a puzzle at the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour. “It's not just a whodunit,” she said. “All the different pieces need to be assembled over the course of the series. And it's a chess game, and it has a lot of different moving parts.”
Molino spoke about her Elena character at press tour. “I was really interested in the duplicity of her character and the mask that she presents with the family in The Greybourne and the two sides of her that she has to juggle because, as we find out, she's kind of working a grift, and there's something going on that we don't quite know,” she said. “For me, it was really fun to kind of figure out, okay, who is the real Elena?”
ABC Signature produces The Watchful Eye along with Ryan Seacrest Productions. ■
