Record-Breaking Memorial Weekend 2013! ‘Fast & … 
Cannes: Competition Movies Divide Critics; How Much Do … 
SAG-AFTRA Sued For Witholding Foreign Residuals And … 
Zach Braff Ends $3+M Kickstarter Campaign 
Fox Unscripted TV Czar Mike Darnell To Exit 
NBC Sets Oklahoma Tornado Benefit Concert For May 29 
Cannes: Directors’ Fortnight Honors ‘Les … 
SHOCKER: Tom Cruise Exits ‘Man From … 
A+E Rebuild: BBC’s Jana Bennett To Run Bio And LMN … 
RATINGS RAT RACE: ‘Hannibal’ Hits Low, … 
‘Katie’ Shakeup: Rachel Miskowiec Replaces … 
Hammond On Cannes: French Hero Jerry Lewis On His Return To … 
Cannes: Another Jewelry Heist? $2.6M Necklace Missing After … 
Hammond On Cannes: Leo DiCaprio’s Moon Trip Tops … 
Specialty B.O. Preview: ‘Before Midnight’, … 
2012-2013 Season Network Rankings: CBS Sweeps In Final … 
Full 2012-2013 TV Season Series Rankings 
TOLDJA! Paramount Pocketing $190M From Disney For Marvel … 
‘Good Morning America’ Hits 19-Year Viewership … 
MGM Buys ‘Modern Family’ Producer Ben … 
‘Fashion Police’ Writers Chant On Picket Lines: … 
EXCLUSIVE: NBC comedy pilot Girlfriend In A Coma will be recasting its lead following the departure of Christina Ricci. I hear Ricci left the project after the table read. She was the first major cast member to board the pilot, which has been a favorite of NBC brass. As part of Ricci’s casting, the project was expected to move after the pilot from Los Angeles to New York where she is based. Production will now likely stay in Los Angeles if the pilot goes to series. Written by Liz Brixius based on Douglas Coupland’s book, Girlfriend In A Coma centers on Karen, a woman who was in a coma for many years and unexpectedly wakes up to find she has a 17-year-old daughter, Evie (Miranda Cosgrove). Daniel Stern and Ann Cusack play Karen’s parents, who have been raising Evie. Recastings are an unfortunate but unavoidable part of pilot season when 100 pilots are being cast in the span of a month and a half. Other pilots that have undergone recastings so far this season include ABC’s Keep Calm And Karey On, Mixology and Pulling, Fox’s The List and Gang Related and NBC’s untitled Robert Padnick.
TV Editor Nellie Andreeva - tip her here.
Loading ...
Knew it was going to happen. She’s just too young looking to pass for Miranda Cosgrove’s mother. NBC should try to get Drew Barrymore for it. I know she’s mostly movie actress but I think she would be perfect.
Or better, get Sally Hawkins to do it. She’s extremely talented, helluva funny and U.S. audience would easily fall in love with her. Just my two cents.
you realize that the character is 17 when she has her daughter. Ricci is the right age.
Ricci was only 13 years older than Cosgrove and looked more like her sister than mother. Hawkins is 17 years older and so would be perfect, don’t you think?
Ricci, however, looks younger than she actually is.
I don’t think you want to replace an actress who is recognizable to the American audience with one who is almost completely unrecognizable.
But she’s better actress than Ricci, she’s critically acclaimed (lots of prestigious awards i.e. Silver Berlin Bear) and she’s age-appropriate. Television needs fresh faces. As I said before, just my two cents.
+1….Sally Hawkins is an amazing actress, and will easily be embraced by American audiences.
It’s time to ditch this fallacy. It’s responsible for a lot of poor casting.
No one cares if an actor is known. They care if an actor is good. People also get sick of the same faces. It can be really welcoming to have fresh faces.
I concur with this!
Drew and Miranda have already worked together on Drew’s music video, and I’m sure that they would have amazing mother/daughter chemistry.
They should’ve kept Ricci and ditched Cosgrove.
no.
Ricci looked amazing (and young) in that terrible Bucky Larson movie. Can’t believe she was cast as a teenager’s mother.
Please. They didn’t sacrifice Ricci to keep Cosgrove. If this followed a table read, it’s because somebody or everybody didn’t think Ricci was up for it. I’m not saying they were right, but this is what happens.
Smart girl•••Departing the sinking ship known as Nbc.I mean really,who really wants to be associated with ANYTHING slated to air on Nbc.Network’s rep is in the toilet. How fitting that Nbc finally has a program with the word coma in the title. In my opinion,Nbc’s programming content has been in a self-induced coma for years…
This sounds like another NBC comedy pilot that will get cancelled early on. Christina Ricci should try for cable, the only medium developing hit television shows. NBC can’t even beat Fox in the ratings.
This is a ridiculously hard role to cast. But as long as Daniel Stern doesn’t leave, I am rooting for the show.
It seems there are a lot of roles that need to be recast this year, especially in the comedies. This is the downside to shooting so many pilots at the same time. She was cast in a tough role, and if she wasn’t right for it there’s nothing that can be done. Too bad they didn’t figure that out sooner, but with luck they’ll recast and shoot a good pilot. And Ricci might find herself on another pilot that’s a better fit for her (as Mandy Moore recently did).
Have they even recast Keep Calm and Karey On? Sounds like a stinker to me bet it doesn’t even shoot. And who wants to be on anything by NBC anyway?? Fly Christina! Fly far far away!
Keep Calm is filming right now.
Who’s Daniel Stern?
Daniel Stern. Did the voice over for The Wonder Years. Was in Something About Mary. Had a sitcom in the 80′s. Was Marv the burglar in Home Alone 1 and 2.
How are you reading an industry website and not know who Daniel Stern is?
Not to mention Breaking Away and appearances in some inconsequential classic Woody Allen films from the absolute heyday.
Mire curious, why ask the question here when there’s an entire Internet out there to ask? Pure snark.
Don’t remember Stern in There’s Something About Mary.
Yet another unfunny Showtime-esque “comedy” heading onto NBC. No-one watches them on Showtime, so who would want to watch a toothless version on broadcast? How many showrunners do the clueless NBC execs need to go through before they figure out that they are the problem?
Meanwhile, the nepotastic Greenblatt gravy train keeps rolling along. He seems to care more about giving his pals jobs than developing successful shows. Hopefully Comcast figures this out and dumps this joker and his clueless minions soon enough.
Knowing NBC, they’ll replace Ricci with Whitney Cummings. At least she looks age appropriate for the part.
They should get Christine Woods. She was hysterical in Perfect Couples!
Already in HBO’s Hello Ladies pilot
Whatever the reason, it’s the right call – Christina Ricci is way too young for the part, and I don’t mean chronologically; however old she is in real life, in reel life, she always has and always will play much younger. I would never cast her to play someone over 30 because she just doesn’t look it. And I assume she would prefer that to the opposite.
In real life she is 13 years older than the actress playing her daughter. In Reel life, as you put it, she looks 3 years older.
Gee, what a surprise as she already ruined Pan Am with her horrific acting and was about to destroy this show in its midst. This woman seriously needs to get some acting lessons if she wants to stay in this business like Adam Sandler should as well. Just a terrible actress overall.
Jeez Zeke. Still bitter she never responded to your poems personally?
Just don’t go shooting a politician or anything to prove your love.
Pan Am failed because of horribly bad writing. The show started well, but in subsequent shows writers turned it into a “soapy” mess instead of a story about Pan Am. The show could have run for years on scripts based on real Pan Am history.
If she left after the first table read it was probably because the script sucked.
Right. Because she had no access to the scrip in any occasion prior to that and just signed blindly…
More likely she felt there was no chemistry between herself and the other actors, and she looked ridiculous side by side with the actress playing her supposedly 17 year old daughter. I don’t know who talked her into this role, but she needs to fire them. This was a waste of everyone’s time.
This. Christina Ricci is only 13 years older that Cosgrove. Cosgrove looks older than 17 and Christina looks like she’s in her late 20s. Just bad, bad casting. Also, at least Pan Am attempted to be ambitious…I just don’t see her doing a standard NBC comedy. Maybe she wants the money and the stability, but she could easily make a career out of doing small indies or at least land a role on an AMC, HBO, or Showtime series.
Exactly. Besides, this is Cosgrove’s show, and production was to be held in Los Angeles. I guess that Ricci don’t want to play a second banana to a former tweener star.
Zeke-I really don’t believe it was Cristina who “ruined” Pan Am. There was probably enough blame to go around with that show. Not enough people watched Pan Am & that’s why it’s not making any more flights
. Blaming Cristina for the failure of the Pam Am series is unfair. One more thing-Cristina wasn’t about to “destroy” this upcoming coma pilot.Just the fact this pilot will air on Nbc will be enough for it to fail… 
One possibility is that she thought the material was so bad after the first table read that she bolted. Or this was an early choice for her until “something better” came along (film or television). Or after the poorly-received Pan Am, she may feel that television isn’t right for her right now.
Whatever her reasons, it is not a good sign when the key (and first) casting choice bolts early on.
I liked Pan Am… I tuned in because if Ricci…but liked the other actresses just as much… I was sad to see it go.
Dick Wolf just had to have her. Well, so much for that. Moving to show to New York for her alone and now she doesn’t want to do it.
There are no good shows anymore, period. People have no want for talented actors or intelligent writing anymore. Everything out there is tripe now. If you want to see one of the last brilliant shows on TV, watch All In The Family. 100% serious. It was the first show to come with a warning back in the day for people who couldn’t handle hearing about sensitive topics (racism, rape, etc). Btw I am not as old as you’d think I am.
Refresh Heroes!!!
The way I heard it, Ricci exited to star in Lynne Ramsay’s next pic.
@Kat,I totally agree with you.All In The Family is one of my all-time favorite shows-a classic! More entertaining than most of the crap which passes for entertainment nowadays! I also am not that old & I watch the old All In The Family episodes on Antenna tv every chance I get!
At least Miranda is in it yet!
The title of this show is terrible. It’s doomed to fail for that alone.