The Blacklist 100th episode: Nathan Lane to play Abraham Stern

From the very beginning The Blacklist has excelled at bringing in notable guest actors, whether it be Alan Alda, Ron Pearlman, Christine Lahti, or many others. We are now pleased to confirm that you can add Nathan Lane to the mix.

NBC announced on Monday that Lane, (whose stage and screen credits are far too extensive to count) will be appearing on The Blacklist 100th episode in a role that should feel very familiar tonally to some of the ones before: Abraham Stern. After all, he is another mysterious Blacklist criminal who has a history of using some mysterious means to get some of what he wants. To be specific, this man has the unique ability to persuade desperate people to do his bidding as he works to gain a fortune he feels is ordained to him.

In a statement confirming this amazing cast news, showrunner Jon Bokenkamp had the following message to pass along:

“Nathan Lane is someone we’ve wanted to have on The Blacklist for a very long time, so when we started crafting our 100th episode, we decided to try and do something special and write a part specifically with Nathan in mind … Imagine our excitement when he said yes! We couldn’t be more thrilled to welcome him to the Blacklist family of criminals, weirdos and nut-jobs. I promise, watching Nathan Lane and James Spader together on screen is going to be an absolute blast.”

By invoking Spader and Lane’s names in the same sentence Bokenkamp has given us everything that we could possibly need to be excited about this. It also does help that NBC is really working hard in order to make The Blacklist 100th episode feel like an event. They haven’t just come out here with some episode that will be exactly like every other that aired beforehand. You’ve got a big-name guest star and hopefully some Easter eggs to stories for the diehard fans!

Before we get there…

There are obviously many other issues that The Blacklist will need to address, with one of the most important ones being trying to figure out one way or another whether or not Tom Keen survives the fall finale on Wednesday (those flash forwards in the premiere has us worried!). This could easily go either way — either Reddington (or someone else) does away with him out of retaliation for seeking out answers via the oft-mentioned bones, or somehow Tom finds a way to survive and starts crafting out whatever he wants his revenge plan to be.

Either way, we’ve got a feeling that this is going to be a heck of a cliffhanger that we are left with while we are forced to wait for the greatness of Nathan Lane in the new year.

What do you want on The Blacklist 100th episode?

Sound off now in the comments!

(Photo: NBC.)