Abbi Jacobson calls A League Of Their Own cancellation excuses "cowardly"
A League Of Their Own star Abbi Jacobson called out Prime Video's decision to blame the series' cancellation on the actor and writer strikes
On Friday, fans of A League Of Their Own—and the future of television in general—were handed a gut-punch of an announcement from The Powers That Be over at Prime Video. League, along with the Chloë Grace Moretz-led sci-fi thriller The Peripheral, both of which had been granted second seasons by the streamer earlier this year, were Canceled with a capital C.
This is a big deal because, as The A.V. Club’s William Hughes explained last week, “It’s been a minute since we’ve seen any of the major studios resort to rescinding previously granted renewals; it was, at least in part, seen mostly as a symptom of the COVID-19 lockdowns, and had largely abated over the last year or two.” But now the streamer has the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to blame. Delayed production on both shows would create a “logjam” in Amazon’s pipeline, Deadline says, widening the gap between seasons one and two to almost three years.
Of course, fans looking for closure (League’s second season had already been reduced to just four episodes) were none too pleased with Prime’s reasoning. Neither was Abbi Jacobson, the show’s star and co-creator (with Will Graham).
“What luck I have had to get to tell these stories and play this character I love so much. What a rare thing in life. And so I am sad today,” said Jacobson, who plays team catcher Carson Shaw, in an Instagram post.
“To blame this cancellation on the strike, (which is an essential fight for fair wages, protections and working conditions, etc…) is bullshit and cowardly,” she continued. “But this post isn’t about all that. About all the ways this show has been put through the ringer. Not today.”
“This post here is about the special show I was lucky to make with so many incredibly talented artists and actors and writers and crew. A show I’m so proud of. Filled to the brim with stories worth telling. Full of so much heart and soul and value. Thank you for watching,” she wrote, before concluding: “To the five.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Sony Pictures Television plans to shop the series around for a new home, so all hope may not be lost. For now, we’ll try to take Jacobson’s lead and simply celebrate the fact that we got such a good season of television. There’s no crying in baseball—even if we’re also pretty damn sad about the whole thing.