Fans of NCIS have had to endure most of this TV season without seeing favorite Pauley Perrette, but now the actress looks to be staging a comeback at her former network. Perrette has just signed on to star in Broke!, a comedy pilot for CBS that will see her playing Jackie, a single mother who decides to let her suddenly penniless sister and brother-in-law live with her. Producer Jennie Snyder Urman (Jane the Virgin) released the official logline for the sitcom, which you can read below:
The manager of a bar, Jackie is feisty, not easily cowed, sometimes hot-headed, the kind of woman who knows her way around a toolbox and an acetylene torch. She’s not thrilled when her snobby rich sister and husband suddenly show up on her doorstep, but she comes to remember how much she loves her sister and learns to appreciate them both in her life.
As you can see from the description, Broke! will see Pauley Perrette taking on a very different role in a very different setting, but after 15 seasons playing forensic scientist Abby Sciuto on NCIS, she's probably ready to spread her acting wings a bit and show fans what else she can do. Right now, Broke! is in the early planning stages, and according to Entertainment Weekly, only Perrette and Jaime Camil (Jane the Virgin), who will play Jackie's brother-in-law Miguel, have been cast in the pilot. The show also doesn't have an official pickup from CBS yet, but if those behind the network like what they see in the pilot, Perrette's fans could have her back on CBS this fall.
Fans of NCIS were stunned in early October 2017 when Pauley Perrette confirmed that she was ready to leave her role on the long-running procedural. There had been rumors circulating that there was either trouble behind the scenes, with some thinking that CBS and those at the show were mad at Perrette, or that the actress wanted to leave to devote time to a skin care line she was working on. While Perrette shot down both of those rumors when she took to Twitter to let fans know she would depart NCIS at the end of Season 15, it took a few more months for her to let us in on why she finally made that move.
About a week before her final episode aired, Perrette said that "it just suddenly became blindingly apparent that now was the time," but she didn't reveal why it was the right time. After her last episode hit CBS in May 2018, though, only a few days went by before Perrette took to Twitter again, with a shocking reason for why she had to leave the series. In a set of posts, Perrette claimed that "multiple physical assaults" on the set led to her having to work in a "horrifying" environment where she no longer felt safe. Perrette also told followers that she originally kept quiet because she was trying to protect people on the show who might lose their jobs if she came forward, even though they had nothing to do with the alleged assaults.
Pauley Perrette also alleged that "a very rich, very powerful publicity machine" was releasing false stories about her to try to shut down the truth, and lobbed the most direct allegation yet by noting "he did it" in one of her tweets. While CBS responded by saying that she did, in fact, come to them with a "workplace concern" and that they took it seriously and worked with her to try to find a solution, no details about the alleged assaults, or confirmation that that was what Perrette's issue was, have ever been released.
Abby was able to leave the show with her head held high after giving fans, and other characters, quite a scare, and it's probably a good bet that Pauley Perrette is glad to have that chapter of her life and career behind her. Considering how difficult she alleged some of her time on NCIS to be, it wouldn't be surprising if Perrette decided to take a long break from acting, with her father even revealing that that was exactly what he suggested she do. But, it looks like having almost a year off was enough of a break for Perrette, and Broke! signals the first project that she's signed on for since leaving NCIS. We don't know why she was attracted to the sitcom yet, but part of it might just be the chance to do a comedy and deal with lighter fare on a weekly basis.
There's sure to be more news to come about Broke! and Pauley Perrette's potential return to CBS, so stay tuned to CinemaBlend for more information as it becomes available. In the meantime, you can keep up with all the TV coming in the next few weeks by checking out our midseason premiere guide.
