Unexpected

[Eli]

I've been doing some thinking, and I have come up with a few tricky situations.

What would the writers do if one of the actors/actresses let's say died in a car accident? And I'm not talking about like if an actor playing a police officer, I'm talking about actors that couldn't be replaced that easyli, like Kate Ritchie and Ray Meagher.

And what is Kate Ritchie got pregnant? How could they explain that without kicking her out of the show until the baby was born? I mean, Sally can't get pregnant!

Just think it's interesting...

[~Lynd~]

If Kate got pregnant they'd send Sally on a holiday or something,as for if someone suddenly died i guess they'd have to get a replacement....

[emmasi]

That's kind of a harsh question... I would hope that if a main cast member died unexpectedly, they would put the show on hold for a while to give the rest of the cast and crew time to deal with it. Then, I guess there would be a replacement.

There was an American sitcom where one of the main cast died. I think it was "Suddenly Susan." They created an episode where everyone was looking for his character, but at the end it was revealed that he'd been killed in an offscreen accident. I don't know if that sounds disrespectful if you haven't seen it, but it was actually really moving because you could see through the characters that the actors themselves were really going to miss him. I think it would take a strong cast to do that.

As for the pregnancy, well Bec Cartwright answers that question. She got knocked up and had to be replaced by a different actress who could run out her character's storylines.

[Reo]

I saw a show once were the actor died and the whole next episode was about the rest of the main cast searching for him..It was really well done and sad.

In UK soaps,if someone is pregnant they make them hide their belly behind stuff,their bags,or sit down with the pillow over their belly,Film them from the shoulders up,things like that..Until it is impossible to hide it,then they dont care,they just dont explain it

Edit: That was the show i was thinking of emmasi,Suddenly Susan..It was a while since i had seen it,then i saw that episode and it was really sad..And i agree..It wasnt the characters being sad,it was truely the actors.

[Pierced Musie]

One of the actresses in Holby City (UK show) died unexpectedly. They wrote the character out by saying she won the lottery and left without telling anyone.

[ste]

One of the actresses in Holby City (UK show) died unexpectedly. They wrote the character out by saying she won the lottery and left without telling anyone.

Oh I'd forgotten that. Didn't she fall off a balcony or something? That was horrific.

Home and Away are pretty imaginative compared to most soaps so if something happened I'm sure they would come up with a good way of handling the character's absence without being disrespectful to the actor.

[~Natasha~]

One of the actresses in Holby City (UK show) died unexpectedly. They wrote the character out by saying she won the lottery and left without telling anyone.

I was just thinking of her when I saw this topic. It was so sad. And they got her Mum to choose the ending aswell which I thought was sweet.

I suppose it depended on if a actress got pregnant in the middle of a storyline (Like Bec) because then they would probably be replaced, also they would have to consider if the actress was going to return.

[katya]

John Ritter (I think that's his name) died when he was still starring in 8 Simple Rules, and they killed off the character as well. I think they thought it would be inappropriate to recast him, and I don't think it would be right for someone like Sally or Alf to be recast either if the worst were to happen. Purely because of their history with the show, and I don't think the majority of viewers would be happy to see them replaced.

Of course I could be wrong, but I'd hate to see another actress/actor play Sally/Alf.

[claire_louise]

The actor didn't die, but in Casualty the character of Finn suddenly disappeared from our screens unexpectedly. They did a whole storyline about how he was missing and eventually police found his body. If something did happen to one of the actors, that would be quite an effective storyline.

Pregnancy isn't such a big deal. You dress the girl in black and film her behind a desk/bar/sofa, or from the waist up. Then you make up some excuse why she has to go away for a while. In Corrie they had Leanne Battersby walking around holding a clipboard in front of her for about 2 months!

[ter06]

If Kate Ritchie died we'd have to have a few days mourning. I'd like to think if something happened to kate, Ray or Lynne that they wouldnt insult us by replacing them with different actors but they did it with Bec and she was there seven years.

Corrie never hide it when one of their stars is pregnant I'll never forget when the acrtess who plays Hayley was pregnant in real life and she so obviously had a big bump on the show even though her character was born a man!! And Frankie is showing a bump now even though she's not pregnant on the show.

Debra Lawrance (Pippa) got pregnant and they wrote her pregnancy into the show but they swiftly killed the baby off after birth as they hadn't planned on having another child on the show.