Is Samantha Coming Back to And Just Like That? The News We Weren’t Expecting
It was in 2017 when Kim Cattrall made the announcement she would be hanging up the Louboutins forever, but shocking news that broke on May 31, 2023, made us question: is Samantha coming back to And Just Like That???
In a tweet in 2017, Cattrall—who played Samantha Jones for all six seasons of Sex and the City and two movies—confirmed that she had retired as the character after news broke that a third Sex and the City movie had been canceled. “Woke 2 a @MailOnline (poop emoji) storm! The only ‘DEMAND’ I ever made was that I didn’t want to do a 3rd film….& that was back in 2016,” Cattrall tweeted at the time in response to a Daily Mail article that reported that she would only sign on for a third film if the production studio, Warner Bros. Pictures, also produced her other projects.
In an interview with Piers Morgan that same year, Cattrall made it clear that she would never play Samantha again. “Not for me. That was part of turning 60. That was a very clear moment of, how many years do I have left and what do I want to do with it? What haven’t I done? I feel that the show was the best when it was the series and the bonus was the two movies,” she said. She explained that she rejected the offer for a third Sex and the City movie because she wants to move on to a new “chapter” in her life. But obviously, things change with time.
Is Samantha coming back to And Just Like That?
According to Variety, Cattrall will reprise her iconic role as Samantha Jones in the season two finale of And Just Like That, but only for one scene. “According to sources, Cattrall shot her dialogue on March 22 in New York City, without seeing or speaking with the stars of the series, including Sarah Jessica Parker, or with And Just Like That showrunner Michael Patrick King,” Variety reported.
“In the scene, Samantha, who in the show has moved to London, will have a phone conversation with Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw. In the first season of “And Just Like That,” Carrie engaged with an estranged Samantha over text, and in the finale, the two made a plan to see each other in order to reconcile.” Legendary costume designer, Patricia Field, who has not worked on the Sex and the City reboots, dressed Cattrall’s character especially for her return scene.
Why was Samantha not in And Just Like That season 1?
During the premiere of And Just Like That season one, Bitsy Von Muffling, a character from Sex and the City, runs into Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda at a restaurant and asks why Samantha wasn’t with them. Carrie and Miranda explain that Samantha moved to London for a job. The viewers learn in a conversation between Carrie and Miranda later in the episode that Carrie hired Samantha to be her publicist for her books, but let her go when the publishing industry went took a turn for the worse. Samantha took the move as a hit to her “ego” and “fired” Carrie as a friend (in Carrie’s own words.) She also cut off Miranda and Charlotte and moved to London. Carrie and Miranda also confirmed that they’ve reached out to Samantha since their fallout but she hasn’t returned their texts or calls. After Big dies at the end of the first episode, Samantha sends Carrie flowers at Big’s funeral. Carrie later texts Samantha to thank her.
While Cattrall has said that money wasn’t the sole reason she decided to retire as Samantha, she has expressed her dissatisfaction with how much she’s been paid on Sex in the City in the past. In an interview on Friday Night With Jonathan Ross in 2004, Cattrall hinted that the pay disparity on Sex and the City between her and SJP was part of the reason she decided to “move on” from the show. “I felt after six years it was time for all of us to participate in the financial windfall of Sex and the City,” she said at the time. “When they didn’t seem keen on that I thought it was time to move on.”
A source told The New York Post in 2017 that some of the Sex and the City crew didn’t think it was fair that Parker was the highest-paid when Samantha was the favorite character for most viewers. “There was a disparity between what Sarah got and what the other girls got. Everyone loved Kim’s character, people related to her—and [Kim’s] salary wasn’t showing that,” the insider said. According to Bustle, Cattrall asked to be paid $1 million per episode for Sex and the City season 7. The request was rejected, which may explain why the series ended after season 6.
And Just Like That season 2 debuts on MAX on June 22.
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