“Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist,” which ran for two seasons and one Christmas TV movie special from 2020 to 2021, was a sweet, weird little show that never picked up an enormous audience — but if you’re at all familiar with the series, you might wonder why Lauren Graham’s Joan Bennett didn’t stick around after the season 2 premiere.
Just as a quick reminder (or introduction, if you’re unfamiliar with this series): “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” stars Jane Levy as Zoey Clarke, a computer programmer living in San Francisco who’s struggling with some family issues when something bizarre happens. While she’s getting an MRI, there’s an earthquake, and all of a sudden, Zoey gains a strange power: She can see people express their real feelings through song, a phenomenon that nobody else witnesses. As for Graham, her character Joan is Zoey’s boss at SPRQ Point, a tech start-up.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter about Graham’s abrupt departure, creator Austin Winsberg explained that it was pretty simple: the COVID-19 pandemic meant that one of Graham’s previous commitments got in the way. Specifically, she was attached to star in “The Mighty Ducks: Game Changers” on Disney+, and that took precedence.
“I would have loved to have had more of her in season 2,” Winsberg told the outlet. He continued:
“Unfortunately, the character of Joan was a victim of [COVID] scheduling. Lauren had committed to doing another show that was supposed to be done shooting by the time we went into production. But the pandemic changed all of that, and both shows ended up shooting at the same time. So, there was just no way for her to do both. However, the door is always open for Lauren and Joan to return, and nothing would make me happier than having her back. Lauren and Jane have such a great rapport when they are playing off of each other. And I feel very fortunate that we were able to get her at all.”
Graham herself confirmed this in a post on X (then called Twitter) alongside the season 2 premiere. “Please watch the first episode of [‘Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist’] tonight! Joan is only there for a wee moment (plans to do more thwarted by pandemic-related scheduling issues), but I’m so excited to watch the incredible [Jane Levy] and company.” Graham then signed the post with a “kiss” (a small “x”) and the initial “L.” So, how did Graham’s Joan officially leave the show, and what did Winsberg say about how she would have factored into season 2 of the series?
Lauren Graham was supposed to stick around on Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist
Not only was Joan going to remain on “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” if Lauren Graham’s schedule had cleared up, but according to Austin Winsberg, she would have appeared in several episodes that season. “Joan was going to be in a lot of the episodes, and then COVID happened, and their whole schedule got changed, and their schedule became the exact same schedule as our schedule, and that’s why you see what happens with Lauren in the first episode,” Winsberg revealed in that THR interview.
“We had to adjust multiple episodes because of it,” Winsberg continued, pointing — unsurprisingly — to the COVID-19 pandemic that shut down large swaths of the globe starting in early 2020. “If [COVID] had not happened, we would’ve been golden, because that show was supposed to shoot from March through June or July, and we were starting up in September, so it would have been fine. But then the schedules happened at the exact same time, and there was no way to make it work.”
To be fair, Joan was a fun character on “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist,” but she wasn’t that vital to the story; this is proven by the way it writes her out, which results in Zoey getting a huge promotion while Joan leaves for a new job opportunity in Singapore. Still, throughout her time on the series, Graham was a lovely presence and tried to hold her own against several of the show’s more powerful vocal performers. (I watched and thoroughly enjoyed this series, but the meanest thing it ever did was force Graham to duet with Tony winner Renée Elise Goldsberry, who has one of the most powerful voices in the industry … and to say that Graham couldn’t fully hold her own is a kind understatement.) The point is, though, that “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” won’t be the show that audiences associate with Graham; that honor belongs to a series that premiered back in the 2000s.
Lauren Graham is an accomplished TV actor — but most audiences know her from Gilmore Girls
If you loved Lauren Graham in her supporting role on “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist,” you should check out her lead performance on “Gilmore Girls” (if you haven’t done so already). In 2000, the channel then known as WB started airing “Gilmore Girls,” which was created by Amy Sherman-Palladino and told the story of a mother and daughter duo living in the tiny, sleepy hamlet of Stars Hollow in Connecticut. When the show begins, precocious teen Rory Gilmore (Alexis Bledel) is set to start her academic career at an exclusive prep school, Chilton — but because the school’s tuition costs are high, Rory’s young single mother Lorelai (Graham) is forced to ask her parents for financial help. Despite a fractured relationship between Lorelai and her wealthy folks Emily and Richard Gilmore (Kelly Bishop and the late, great Edward Hermann), they agree to cover the tuition with one caveat: Rory and Lorelai must have dinner with Richard and Emily every Friday night.
As Rory gets used to Chilton and Lorelai tries to deal with her overbearing and often elitist parents, the show chronicles Rory and Lorelai’s day-to-day lives, their endless coffee consumption, and their great loves. (Debates over Rory’s “best boyfriend” rage to this day, and I’m here to tell you that the answer is actually Matt Czuchry’s Logan Huntzberger. Argue with the wall.) After the original show came to a close in 2007, and after Sherman-Palladino and her husband Daniel Palladino were unceremoniously cast aside for the seventh and “final” season, “Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life” came to Netflix in 2016 and added four new chapters to Rory and Lorelai’s story with long episodes that span the four seasons of, well, one year. We probably won’t see Graham play Lorelai or Joan again any time soon, but failing that, you can stream “Gilmore Girls” on both Netflix and Hulu, “A Year in the Life” on Netflix, and “Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist” on Peacock.
