It seemed like a bit of a disaster when Rosemarie DeWitt exited her recurring role on Season 2 of The Newsroom. Just a few days after the sophomore show’s news was announced the role has already been recast. Veteran actress Marcia Gay Harden will be taking on the Season 2 role.
Harden is set to play Rebecca Halliday, a lawyer who comes into contact with the Atlantis Cable News after a wrongful termination suit comes up. EW is reporting the news, also noting Harden will re-shoot the scenes DeWitt shot already in order to avoid any possible continuity problems. The show shouldn’t have any timetable problems with the re-shooting, provided Harden’s schedule is open, since The Newsroom isn't set to return to HBO’s schedule until this summer.
Initially, when DeWitt signed on to play Halliday, she actually shot a few episodes for Season 2. However, the writers then determined they wanted to rewrite the character’s storyline. Normally, this wouldn’t be a big deal for a regular character, but since the role was recurring, the timeline for shooting and re-shooting some of the actress’ episodes didn’t totally work for her. The conflict was big enough that she eventually had to bow out, but luckily, it doesn’t seem like the actress had any beef with the show or anyone involved with it. Hopefully, Harden can bring some good stuff to the table in the role.
In other news, who do you think is being fired from the company in order to cause a lawsuit in Season 2?
