{"id":883540,"date":"2026-10-15T20:06:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T20:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/883540\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T20:06:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T20:06:09","slug":"newlyweds-bruce-helford-tapped-as-new-showrunner-hiatus-extended","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/883540\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Newlyweds’: Bruce Helford Tapped As New Showrunner, Hiatus Extended"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tNBC<\/a> and Universal Television are bringing in a steady hand to take the reins of freshman multi-camera comedy Newlyweds<\/a>, hiring sitcom veteran Bruce Helford<\/a> (The Conners) as new showrunner to replace Gail Lerner<\/a> who was fired last Friday<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\n\tNewlyweds, co-created by Lerner and Jamie Lee Curtis<\/a>, is currently on a previously scheduled weeklong hiatus. The break will now be extended, giving Helford time to get up to speed on the series, starring T\u00e8a Leoni, Tim Daly and Curtis, which filmed Episode 8 of its 13-episode order on Friday. Production will resume in November. <\/p>\n

\n\tHelford brings in four decades of sitcom experience \u2014 the vast majority of it on broadcast \u2014 and strong track record handling big personalities on shows like Roseanne, headlined by Roseanne Barr, as well as Anger Management, of which he somehow delivered 100 episodes in the span of two and a half years with Charlie Sheen starring in the wake of his public meltdown and firing from Two and a Half Men.<\/p>\n

\n\tHis extensive showrunner resume also includes The Drew Carey Show and George Lopez, which he co-created, and, most recently, The Conners.<\/p>\n

\n\tNewlyweds is a later-in-life love story about a free-spirited woman (Leoni) and a buttoned-up professor (Leoni\u2019s real-life husband Daly) who marry impetuously after a whirlwind courtship<\/p>\n

\n\tHelford is known mostly for male-lead and family sitcoms (the list also includes The Norm Show and Kevin Can Wait), so doing a rom-com may seem like a stretch for him. <\/p>\n

\n\tOne of his first writing jobs was actually on the 1989 ABC sitcom Anything But Love, about the romance of co-workers played by leads Curtis and comedian Richard Lewis.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt was my favorite job I\u2019ve ever had,\u201d Curtis recalled about her experience on Anything But Love during a recent panel for Newlyweds<\/a>. \u201cAnd I\u2019m 68 years old, and every single year, all I\u2019ve ever said to my agents is \u2018I want to do a sitcom, all I want to do is a sitcom.\u2019<\/p>\n

\n\tNewlyweds stars Leoni, Daly, Curtis, Emma Meisel, Ignacio Diaz-Silverio and Bill O\u2019Neill. Helford executive produces with Lerner, Eric and Kim Tannenbaum and Jason Wang for the Tannenbaum Company, Curtis, Scott Schwartz and Lionsgate Television. Pam Fryman directed and executive produced the pilot. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe series, produced by Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group, premieres Friday, Oct. 23 at 8:30 PM, immediately following the season premiere of Happy\u2019s Place.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThat truly was an instance of creative differences, and we feel like that concept of a romantic comedy in a multi-cam format was very winning. And that cast is phenomenal with T\u00e9a, Tim, and Jamie,\u201d NBC and Peacock Scripted Content President Lisa Katz told Deadline<\/a> on Friday about Lerner\u2019s exit. \u201cSo, we\u2019re working to find the right person and move forward, and we\u2019re still really, really invested and committed to it, and feel like it\u2019s a great companion to Happy\u2019s Place too.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBC and Universal Television are bringing in a steady hand to take the reins of freshman multi-camera comedy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":883541,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[370893,88,217389,20055,1254,175675,92],"class_list":["post-883540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-bruce-helford","tag-entertainment","tag-gail-lerner","tag-jamie-lee-curtis","tag-nbc","tag-newlyweds","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=883540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883540\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883541"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}