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Starz has announced an entirely new look for “The Girlfriend Experience” as it returns for Season 2.

In a change from the show’s original format, it will follow two parallel stories this season. The show, which will return for 14 episodes, will be set in both Washington, D.C., and New Mexico.

Anna Friel (“Broken,” “Marcella,” “Pushing Daisies”), Louisa Krause (“Billions,” “Blue Bloods,” “The Flick”) and Carmen Ejogo (“Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them,” “Selma,” “Zero Hours,”) will star in the new version.

Steven Soderbergh and Philip Fleishman are back as executive producers. The two parallel storylines will each be written, directed and executive produced by Lodge Kerrigan and Amy Seimetz, who also return from season 1.

“It was always our intention to change the universe every season, but Amy and Lodge have cranked up the ambition, scope, and complexity of the show by creating two storylines even more provocative and confrontational than last year’s. I’m as excited as a Swedish person is allowed to get,” Soderbergh said.

Kerrigan’s storyline is “set against the backdrop of the corrupting influence of dark money in the upcoming 2018 U.S. mid-term elections, where everything and everyone has a price. This section of the second season of ‘The Girlfriend Experience’ tracks an unexpected and complex relationship between Erica Myles (Friel), a commanding and strong-willed finance director of a Republican super PAC, and Anna Greenwald (Krause), a confident and intelligent GFE provider at the top of her game. Erica is under intense pressure to deliver on her super PAC fundraising goals.

“She meets Anna and enlists her help in blackmailing a high-powered dark money fundraiser. After their initial exchange, Erica and Anna fall into a complicated sexual relationship, marked by an exploration of vulnerability, dominance and submission, which also draws in Erica’s manipulative ex-girlfriend. The mix of personal instability and career pressure mount and lead Erica down a path, both professionally and personally, that she struggles to control.”

Seimetz’s storyline “follows Bria Jones (Ejogo). After discovering disturbing information about a regular client, Jones is forced to relocate to a remote location in New Mexico. Unable to shake her desire for risky relationships and the finer things in life, Bria navigates her new penniless and surreal existence by forming eerily intimate transactional relationships. While Bria’s ghosts from the past continue to haunt, her new connections with men redefine the meaning of the Girlfriend Experience.”

Season 1 of “The Girlfriend Experience,” based on Steven Soderbergh’s 2009 film, starred Riley Keough, aired last year on Starz.

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Season two will focus on entirely new characters and take on a new format by following two parallel storylines each written, directed and executive produced by Lodge Kerrigan and Amy Seimetz. Kerrigan's storyline is set against the backdrop of the corrupting influence of dark money in the upcoming 2018 U.S. midterm elections, where everything and everyone has a price. The second season tracks an unexpected and complex relationship between Erica Myles (Anna Friel), a commanding and strong-willed finance director of a Republican super PAC, and Anna Garner (Louisa Krause), a confident and intelligent GFE provider at the top of her game. Under intense pressure to deliver on her super PAC fundraising goals, Erica meets Anna and enlists her help in attempting to blackmail a high-powered dark money fundraiser, in order to gain access to his secret donor network. After their initial exchange, Erica and Anna fall into a complicated sexual relationship, marked by an exploration of vulnerability, dominance and submission. A relationship that changes the trajectory of Erica's personal and professional lives and takes Anna into new emotional territory. Seimetz's storyline follows Bria Jones (Carmen Ejogo), a former high-end escort who enters the Witness Protection Program in order to escape her abusive relationship. After being torn from her upscale lifestyle, Bria and her estranged step-daughter are relocated to New Mexico where they are overseen by a commanding US Marshal, Ian Olsen (Tunde Adebimpe). Despite orders to stay low, Bria begins to revive her career as a sex worker, still enraptured by the allure of precarious relationships and lavish gifts. Bria's moonlighting only becomes more complicated when it threatens to ensnare her new identity, her step-daughter, and the government official put in charge of her well-being. Bria quickly realizes she not only has to protect herself from her domineering ex but the very people who are supposed to be protecting her. Bria is forced to take matters into her own hands as she gambles not only her own safety but the people around her in a bid to regain the life she once had.

PRINCIPAL CAST INFORMATION:
· Anna Friel as Erica Myles (Season 2)
· Carmen Ejogo as Bria Jones (Season 2)
· Louisa Krause as Anna Greenwald (Season 2)

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“The Girlfriend Experience” Season 3 is set amidst the London tech scene and focuses on Iris, a neuroscience major. As she begins to explore the transactional world of The Girlfriend Experience, Iris quickly learns that her client sessions provide her with a compelling edge in the tech world and vice versa. She then begins to question whether her actions are driven by free will, or something else altogether, and heads down a deep path of exploration.

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