Christina Applegate Leaves Up All Night

[Mr. Television]

http://www.deadline.com/2013/02/chri...ht-nbc-series/

Christina Applegate Departing ‘Up All Night’
By NELLIE ANDREEVA | Friday February 8, 2013 @ 12:28pm PSTTags:


EXCLUSIVE UPDATED: NBC‘s plan to revamp single-camera sophomore comedy Up All Night as a multi-camera sitcom has suffered a major blow. I’ve learned that series star Christina Applegate is leaving the Lorne Michaels-produced project, which is still being re-conceptualized and is yet to film any of the five episodes in front of a live audience that had been planned. “It’s been a great experience working on Up All Night, but the show has taken a different creative direction and I decided it was best for me to move on to other endeavors,” Applegate said. “Working with Lorne Michaels has been a dream come true and I am grateful he brought me into his TV family. I will miss the cast, producers and crew, and wish them the best always.” NBC would not comment. Some sources say the network is still looking to proceed with the series and may be eyeing Friends alumna Lisa Kudrow as a potential replacement for Applegate, while others say the show is now dead. Meanwhile, Applegate is getting ready to reprise her role in the Anchorman sequel, which begins filming this month.

Applegate’s exit follows the recent departure of series creator/executive producer Emily Spivey as the show has experienced a lot of behind-the-scenes turnover since last May when original showrunner Jon Pollack left. He was replaced by Tucker Cawley who, in turn, was replaced by Linda Wallem when NBC decided to turn Up All Night into a multi-camera comedy after 11 softly rated episodes of Season 2. Along with the format switch, Up All Night is undergoing creative changes, including in the balance between family and workplace comedy, that have not been completely locked in yet.

At TCA last month, NBC Entertainment president Jennifer Salke indicated that the strength of the show’s all-star cast – Applegate, Will Arnett and Maya Rudolph — was key in the decision to keep it going. “We know that that talented cast of actors, they’re not growing on trees,” she said, calling the multi-camera revamp “a bit of an experiment” but “we think it’s really one worth taking.”

In its original incarnation, Up All Night was a family comedy about new parents played by Applegate and Arnett, which was inspired by Spivey’s real-life experiences of going back to work soon after giving birth. Applegate sparked at the concept as she too was a brand new mom when she signed on for the project. The workplace element was expanded and switched from a PR firm to an Oprah-like talk show when Rudolph was cast as Applegate’s boss, and there has been speculation that the series will shift even further in that direction when it becomes multi-camera.

Up All Night was a noble effort — an unfiltered look at parenthood with a top-notch cast, which received mostly positive renews when it launched in fall 2011. But it didn’t quite click with audiences and, after so many changes to the show and its team that have taken it so far from the original vision, maybe it is time to let go.

[80sTrivia]

Wow...definitely a shock that Christina would opt to leave the show...

[robyrob]

i gave up on the show in its first season, but without Christina Applegate there isn't even a reason to check it out after the changes

[TMC]

http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-wat...s-up-all-night

* In the original pilot episode, Applegate and Maya Rudolph's characters were PR specialists. By the time the series made it to air, Rudolph was a talk show host, and Applegate her producer.

* Midway through the first season, the talk show got new management, and Applegate had a new boss to deal with.

* At the start of the second season, the talk show was canceled, and all the characters who worked on it other than Applegate and Rudolph's were eliminated from the show.

* Where the original premise had involved Will Arnett's lawyer choosing to be a stay-at-home dad while Applegate worked, in the new season, Applegate became primary caregiver, and Arnett went back to work — not as a lawyer, but as a contractor, working alongside Applegate's previously-unseen brother.

* When none of that worked, NBC put production on hiatus and announced plans to retool it as a traditional multi-cam comedy shot in front of a live studio audience.

* While that retooling was underway, the show's creator Emily Spivey quit — no doubt in frustration over how little the show now resembled the one she had devised.

[Mr. Television]

The show's dead. There comes a time when it can't be saved. Lisa Kudrow replacing Applegate won't work.. . They're better off developing a new show for Kudrow instead.

[Cyrax]

BuzzFeed's Kate Aurthur says the planned multi-camera version of the show would be a huge change, not just a formatting tweak. "The new 'Up All Night,' should it ever exist, is the behind-the-scenes in the making of a TV show," she tweeted — with the cast playing actors and everything. Oy, just make a different show, you guys!

http://www.vulture.com/2013/02/chris...all-night.html

So it would be basically a completely new show anyway?! Behind the scenes of what, the Ava show resurrected?

Though I don't believe they are going to film anymore episodes, it will die a quiet death.

[James28]

Remember the last time a comedy featuring Christina Applegate was going to be converted from single-camera to multi-camera (Samantha Who?)? That show was cancelled after two seasons instead.

Christina Applegate must not like multi-camera comedy, or even being in one.