Dennis Quaid to play George W. Bush as American Crime Story tackles Hurricane Katrina

Dennis Quaid will play former president George Bush. Photo / Supplied

The actor from such movies as Wyatt Earp and A Dog's Purpose will portray the former president in Katrina: American Crime Story, according to the Hollywood Reporter. Quaid has previously portrayed President Bill Clinton in The Special Relationship.

FX's crime anthology series enjoyed a massively successful first season that chronicled the racially charged trail of O.J. Simpson. It was nominated for 22 Emmys, making it the most-nominated show of 2015, and won nine - including "Outstanding Limited Series."

"The Ferguson stuff was going down and the Black Lives Matter movement had begun" when they were preparing for that season, executive producer Ryan Murphy told Entertainment Weekly. "We were shooting stuff that had already been written months before, and we were like, 'Wow, the more things change, the more things stay the same.' It was heartbreaking. I think all of us felt an obligation to get that stuff right."

For the show's second season, Murphy decided to widen its scope from the trial of a single man to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which caused widespread destruction along the Gulf Coast. The show is expected to focus on New Orleans.

"I want this show to be a socially conscious, socially aware examination of different types of crime around the world," Murphy told the Hollywood Reporter of the new series. He said he considers Katrina "a crime against a lot of people who didn't have a strong voice, and we're going to treat it as a crime. That's what this show is all about."

Bush was heavily criticized for the federal government's federal government's response to the disaster, which left many people stranded on bridges and roofs for days. The Washington Post deemed it the second worst moment of his presidency.

"Hurricane Katrina in 2005 was the last straw for Bush's second term, with his widely criticized handling of the recovery pretty much precluding him from any kind of success in his final years in office," wrote The Washington Post's Aaron Blake, who pointed to, among other things, "an iconic image of Bush flying over the wreckage of Katrina on his way back from a vacation rather than going there immediately."

It's unclear which story the show will focus on, but film actors have been cast for several major political figures.

Matthew Broderick of Ferris Bueller's Day Off fame will portray Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Director Michael D. Brown, who was criticized alongside Bush, who famously told him, "Brownie, you're doing a heckuva job."

Annette Bening will portray Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco.

The series is expected to air in 2018.

The team behind American Crime Story is already looking beyond it, however. The topic for the third season will be about the 1997 murder of Gianni Versace and the fourth season will trace the Monica Lewinsky scandal, according to the Hollywood Reporter.