Catherine Willows isn't leaving CSI anytime soon.  Marg Helgenberger, who portrays the blood spatter analyst on the forensic drama, has decided to sign a new contract to keep her character on the CBS show for two more years.  This 49-year-old actress is reportedly the last original cast member to re-up her contract.

Helgenberger joined CSI in 2000 as a former show girl employed as a blood spatter analyst.  Her performance as the female lead earned her two Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe nominations.  In 2005, she and her fellow cast members won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series.

There's been a lot of flux on CSI.  At the end of season 7, Jorja Fox decided to leave the show and her character Sara Sidle was written out in the first two episodes of the year.  Although she's now out of the canvas, producers left the door open for her to return seeing that they didn't kill her character off.

Unfortunately for Gary Dourdan, who played audio-video analyst Warrick Brown since the beginning of the show, his character has been shot in the recent season 8 finale.  At this point, this doesn't give Dourdan, who has been involved in a serious felony arrest earlier this month for drugs, a big leap of chance to reprise his CSI character.

With the cast of CSI down by two, and contracts up for renegotiation, there was a question if other actors on the show would be taking their leave as well.  Nevertheless, Helgenberger's contract renewal coupled with lead actor William Petersen's signing a new deal in April could mean that CSI is arguably in good shape for the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, fans of Marg Helgenberger can catch her in the upcoming animated film Conan: Red Nails in which she provides the voice of Princess Tascela.


-Kris De Leon, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: USA Today
(Image courtesy of CBS)