As reported by Deadline, Lena Dunham has been forced to recast the lead of her new HBO comedy pilot, Max, after original star Lisa Joyce got a better offer somewhere else (in this case it’s Insecure, another HBO comedy pilot). Deadline believes there were also “creative differences on the future” of the main character, “which contributed to the casting change,” but there aren’t any specifics about that. Either way, the lead will now be played by Zoe Kazan (Olive Kitteridge), who also happens to be starring in another HBO pilot (David Simon’s The Deuce), suggesting that the premium cable network is dangerously short on young female actors.
Creative differences about the future aside, Max will still revolve around “ambitious magazine writer” Maxine Woodruff as she “stumbles into the forefront” of second-wave feminism in 1963, even though “both she and the world may not be ready” for it. Max is still just a pilot at this point, but with Dunham and some of the other Girls people working on it, it seems pretty likely that HBO will take it to series.