Actress
Christina Applegate had planned to stay away from doing television series, but a series of unfortunate events led her to reconsider re-entering the small screen.
Just what were those unfortunate events?
“I broke my foot, lost my show, had my show, lost my marriage, came back home, and it was like nobody knew me,” Applegate, the star of ABC's new comedy series
Samantha Who?, told the
New York Times.
The 36-year old actress was talking about the time when producers pulled the plug on a revival of Sweet Charity because of her fracture, after which she pleaded with them to change their minds. She then split from actor Johnathan Schaech, and found it hard to land movie roles when her New York gig ended by the end of 2005.
Now that she
is back in television, however, Christina Applegate is riding an all-new career high. Her new sitcom,
Samantha Who?, is drawing an average of 14.1 million viewers, making it the top freshman series of the fall. It is among today's most-watched half-hour comedies, trailing behind CBS'
Two and a Half Men.
On
Samantha Who?, Applegate plays Samantha Newly, a woman who comes out of an accident with amnesia. As she tries to put together bits and pieces of her life, she comes to realize that she wasn't such an ideal person before her accident, and consequently sets out to make up for her wrongdoings.
Part of the show's humor comes from learning about Samantha's past, which is achieved by featuring flashbacks to when Samantha was still her old bad self.
“We told her she'd get to play two characters without having to put on a black wig and pretend to be her evil sister,” Donald Todd, who created
Samantha Who? with novelist Cecelia Ahern and is an executive producer, told the
New York Times.
There is one thing that has dampened the show's momentum, and that is the ongoing WGA strike. Although Christina Applegate is supportive of the writers, she admits that it's “awful to have this momentum and be all excited, and all these great things are happening, then the brakes are put on.”
The show just finished filming its last available script, and Applegate said that it was a tearful goodbye between her and her
Samantha Who? costars, which include
Jean Smart,
Jennifer Esposito,
Kevin Dunn,
Barry Watson (
7th Heaven) and
Melissa McCarthy (
Gilmore Girls).
“I just burst into tears,” she said.
-Lisa Claustro, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Source: The New York Times
(Image Courtesy of ABC)