Deadline reports that Christina Applegate, the star of NBC’s troubled comedy Up All Night, has left the show. Applegate gave a statement saying, “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.†The new creative direction Applegate is referring to is a decision by NBC back in October to shut down production for five months in order to retool Up All Night as a multi-camera sitcom with a studio audience. Following the news, the show got a new showrunner, Linda Wallem, in December and creator Emily Spivey left the series without explanation last month. Up All Night has yet to film the planned five multi-camera episodes that were intended to close out its second season and kick off the new 2.0 version of the show, but at this point, I doubt if that’s even gonna happen. With Christina Applegate - one of the show’s two central stars - gone, it seems like it’d be difficult to retool the show to work without her. Is Will Arnett’s character just going to be a single parent now? Or are they going to replace Applegate with another actress? I wouldn’t be surprised if NBC just axed the show right now before undergoing the costly, risky, unprecedented switch to make Up All Night a multi-camera show, but the network has yet to announce plans for the show post-Applegate’s departure.
