SALON

Tuesday, Mar 12, 2013 10:02 PM UTC

Kristen Schaal to replace Mandy Moore in ABC pilot

The singer-actress voluntarily exited the role on Friday

By

Topics: mandy moore, kristen schaal, ABC, Television, casting,

Kristen Schaal to replace Mandy Moore in ABC pilotKristen Schaal

The “Daily Show” correspondent who first gained fame as stalker/fan-girl Mel in “Flight of the Conchords” will replace ’90s teen idol Mandy Moore in ABC’s pilot for “Pulling,” reports Deadline.

Moore was originally cast to play Louise, one of three dysfunctional women in their 30s, alongside comedians Jenny Slate and June Diane Raphael. But Moore exited the pilot on Friday, with the producers saying, “As we moved closer to production, it was clear we needed to go in a different direction for the character, and Mandy agreed to do what was best for the show. She’s an immensely gifted actress and we hope to have the pleasure of working with her again.”

It’s refreshing that producers opted to cast a female lead known for her humor and not her pop star appeal in a comedy (the A.V. Club describes the decision as “a bold new initiative in TV development called ‘thinking about stuff first’) — which reminds us of something Schaal told Salon in 2010 about always being cast as “the dorky girl”:

“It’s still exciting for me, though. I like that I stick out. I was watching ‘Valentine’s Day’ on the plane recently. I have a tiny part in that movie. I was watching all the women — Jessica Biel, and Emma Roberts, and Jennifer Garner and Julia Roberts. They are gorgeous women, and I don’t want to take anything away from them, but they all do have a very classical look, with a very thin nose. I’m watching this parade of these faces and then, boom, it was my face, and I was taken aback. I was like, “Oh, my nose is so big!” I have never in my life thought I had a big nose, but, well, there it was.

The first time I was on TV, on ‘Flight of the Conchords,’ someone put up a YouTube clip and said, ‘You’re too ugly to be on TV.” And I was like, “That is exactly why it’s a good thing that I’m on TV.’ “

Prachi Gupta is an Assistant News Editor for Salon, focusing on pop culture. Follow her on Twitter at @prachigu or email her at pgupta@salon.com. More Prachi Gupta.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 7 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations