Jennifer Coolidge and Alan Ruck have been tapped to star in ABC's comedy pilot Family of the Year. The show revolves around the Halloways, a 10-time winner of the "family of the year" title in their dusty New Mexico home town. The Hollywood Reporter adds Coolidge will play the family's matriarch, a former beauty queen; Ruck will play her affable but not very bright husband.

Alanna Ubach has joined Fox's comedy pilot Playing Chicken, which centers on two brothers with opposite political views who are forced to live together after one (Norbert Leo Butz) suffers an accident that leaves him in a wheelchair; Ubach will play his physical therapist, on whom he has a crush.

Josh Dean has come aboard the Fox comedy pilot The Beast; it centers on a womanizing veterinarian (Steve Howey). Dean will play the vet's assistant.

Alex Borstein has been cast in ABC's comedy pilot The Thick of It. The show follows the workers in the office of a low-level congressman; Borstein will play the congressman's press secretary.

Anna Chlumsky has landed a lead in CW's comedy pilot Eight Days a Week, which centers on four twentysomethings who work under the top movers and shakers in New York City; Chlumsky will play one of them, a girl-next-door personal assistant to an egomaniacal Web site publisher.

According to Variety, Rob Heubel will star in the NBC comedy pilot Zip; he'll play Tripp Stringer, a scam artist and family man.

Robert Hoffman has been added as a guest star on two Fox pilots: As Josh on the single-camera untitled Liz Meriwether comedy, and as Gordon in the mostly improv entry Revenge.

Michael Shanks has landed a four-episode arc on Fox's 24.