'The Hot Zone happened because of Ridley'

New Delhi: Julianna Margulies says she has so much trust in Ridley Scott that she would not mind reading even a phone book for her longtime collaborator.

The actor, who worked with the Oscar-winning director on her most acclaimed project, The Good Wife, said starring in 'The Hot Zone' was a no brainer as Scott was one of the executive producers on the new show.

"Ridley Scott, who was my boss on The Good Wife, was a very big pull for me (for this show). I knew I was in good hands. He's the one who got me to do 'The Good Wife' actually. I would pretty much read the phone book for him," she said.

In the six-part limited series from National Geographic, Margulies plays real-life figure Dr Nancy Jaax, a US Army scientist who is appointed to work on the Ebola outbreak operation for their United States Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID).

The show is based on Richard Preston's 1994 book of the same name.

The actor said the project was sitting on Scott and producer Lynda Obst's desks for around 30 years and was supposed to be a two-hour film.

Margulies said the fact that the movie didn't happen was a "silver lining" as she believes a 120-minute-long project would have hardly done justice to the story of 'The Hot Zone'.

The 52-year-old actor said she was "dumbfounded" when she read the script that she had never heard about Ebola hitting the US soil in 1989.

'The Hot Zone', which hails from Fox 21 Television Studios, starts streaming on Hotstar premium on June 7. It will premiere on National Geographic soon.