‘American Horror Story: Hotel’: Michael Chiklis joins new comedy pilot; what does it mean?

Is Michael Chiklis not going to be checking into “American Horror Story: Hotel” for its upcoming season? If nothing else, we do at least know that the man has one other potential project lined up.

According to a new report from Deadline, Chilkis has signed up alongside Cheryl Hines of “Suburgatory” fame to appear in the NBC comedy pilot “Cuckoo,” an adaptation of the BBC Three series about a young woman who returns home from a summer abroad married to eccentric man by the name of Cuckoo. Michael would play the father in the series, which is being written by Robin French and Kieron Quirke, the creative forces behind the original. Flula Borg has been cast in the role of Cuckoo. Chiklis was into comedy even before the days of “The Shield” or “American Horror Story,” so it is really not that big of a shock to see him returning to that world.

It is certainly still possible that Chiklis could still be on the FX drama for at least some other episodes coming up, but this gig does show us that he is looking to gain some full-time employment elsewhere. In turn, that means that he’s probably not a regular contributor. This is not nearly as big of a blow to some perhaps as losing Jessica Lange, but mostly just because he was only a part of one season, while she was a huge force in four different ones.

We’re going to get a much better sense of this in the weeks and months ahead. As of right now, the only things that are particularly clear are that Lady Gaga, Matt Bomer, Wes Bentley, and Cheyenne Jackson are all going to be huge stars of the upcoming season. If you want to get more news on that, head over to the link here.

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