NBC's new sitcom Newlyweds has lost its showrunner two weeks before its premiere. Gail Lerner, who created the show with Jamie Lee Curtis, announced on social media that she had been fired, in the same post in which she urged people to watch the October 23 debut.
"The reason I've been given is 'creative differences'," Lerner wrote, according to Deadline. She called it the most joyous TV experience of her life and praised the cast, crew and writers. Her "silver lining", she said, was that the first six episodes were made under her leadership, and she would not change a thing.
Six episodes of thirteen
That silver lining is also the measure of what she will not oversee. According to Deadline's sources, Newlyweds was scheduled to film episode 8 of its 13-episode order on the day the news broke. The show goes on a pre-planned hiatus next week, and NBC and the studio, Universal Television, are expected to use the time to find a new showrunner. The pause may run longer.
- Episodes 1 to 6: made under Lerner, by her account.
- Episode 7: not mentioned in her post.
- Episode 8: filming on the day of the announcement.
- Episodes 9 to 13: will be made after the hiatus, under someone else.
So the series Lerner co-created and wrote will have, at most, just over half of its first season made under her. The six she is proud of are the ones viewers will see first.
The post did not attack the network. "No one knows what's going to happen in our meshuganah business," Lerner wrote, "but I predict this show's gonna be a barn burner." She asked people to watch the first six episodes "and beyond", to tell her if they liked them, and to keep it to themselves if they did not.
Days earlier, she was still the showrunner
When NBC released the first trailer earlier this month, Deadline's report on it stated that Lerner would serve as showrunner. In August, at NBC's fall preview, she thanked the network for "reinvesting in multi-cam and bringing back must see TV".
At that panel, she told the story of how the show got made. Curtis brought her the idea during the pandemic. For "a million various reasons", it went into what she called hibernation; a lot of people said the project had died, but she knew it was only sleeping. Then NBC called in November 2025 and said, let's do that show.
From that phone call to the firing took less than a year. Lerner started her career on NBC's Will & Grace. Her post ended with a line she credited to a friend: better to die on your feet than live on your knees.
What Newlyweds is
The multi-camera comedy is a later-in-life love story. Jeanie (Téa Leoni), a free-spirited woman, and James (Tim Daly), a buttoned-up professor, marry impetuously after a whirlwind courtship. Leoni and Daly are married in real life.
- Jamie Lee Curtis plays Claudia, James' ex-wife. She also co-created the show and executive produces.
- Al Madrigal plays Dan, James' divorced best friend and the couple's matchmaker.
- Bill O'Neill plays Arvid, James' assistant in the philosophy department.
- Emma Meisel and Ignacio Diaz-Silverio play Jeanie's children, Poppy and Lolo.
- Behind the camera: Pam Fryman directed and executive produced the pilot. Eric and Kim Tannenbaum, Jason Wang, Scott Schwartz and Lionsgate Television also executive produce. Leoni is a producer.
Curtis has said the idea came from her own marriage. At the August panel she explained that she married filmmaker Christopher Guest after seeing his picture in a magazine, and that they had never spent more than 72 hours together at one time before the wedding. They have been married for 42 years.
NBC's bet on Friday nights
Newlyweds is not just another new comedy for NBC. The network set out this development season to find a companion for its multi-camera hit Happy's Place, starring Reba McEntire. It greenlit two pilots. Newlyweds was the one that went to series, and it will join Happy's Place in a Friday comedy block.
Curtis has been the show's loudest advocate for the format. She told the August panel that she has asked her agents for a sitcom every year, that her favourite job was the 1988 ABC multi-cam Anything But Love, and that single-camera comedy, which she has done on New Girl, is "not fun" because nobody laughs on set. Leoni recalled her multi-cam days on Flying Blind and The Naked Truth; Daly pointed to young fans discovering Wings.
Curtis even pitched the block's slogan at the panel: "Fridays: We Are In Love On NBC".
What is still unknown
- Who replaces Lerner. NBC and Universal Television have not named anyone.
- What the "creative differences" were. No other side of the story has been made public.
- How long the hiatus lasts, and whether the back half of the order is affected.
- Whether Lerner keeps her credits as co-creator and executive producer on the remaining episodes.
In August, Lerner thanked NBC for bringing back must-see TV. In October, she used one post to promote the premiere and to announce that NBC had taken her off the show.