Final August, Deadline reported that John Corbett was set to reprise his function of Aidan Shaw for Season 2 of Intercourse and the Metropolis’s sequel sequence, And Simply Like That.
In case you didn’t know, Aidan was one in every of Carrie Bradshaw’s two primary love pursuits within the SATC franchise, alongside Chris Noth’s Massive.
Massive was launched within the very first episode of the present again in 1999, whereas Aidan made his debut in Season 3. Carrie’s relationship with Aidan was consistently examined by her incapability to maneuver on from Massive, who she ultimately cheated on Aidan with.
Then, within the 2010 film Intercourse and the Metropolis 2, Carrie shocked followers when she kissed Aidan after they ran into one another in Abu Dhabi — regardless of her being married to Massive by this level.
Massive ended up forgiving Carrie for the indiscretion, and this was the final time that we noticed Aidan on our screens. Till this week.
Season 1 of And Simply Like That premiered in 2021 and revealed that Carrie and Massive had remained collectively within the years because the second film, and have been having fun with a cheerful marriage.
However tragedy struck on the finish of the primary episode when Massive died all of a sudden of a coronary heart assault, with the remainder of the season exploring Carrie coping with her grief.
In Season 2, nevertheless, Carrie was prepared to maneuver on and reached out to her former lover by way of e mail in final week’s episode of the present, with John making his much-anticipated return as Aidan on Thursday.
Following the onscreen comeback, And Simply Like That’s govt producer, Michael Patrick King, opened up about the best way that he approached John to reprise his notorious function — and he didn’t maintain again.
In actual fact, Michael instructed the actor that earlier than filming started he wanted to have a full makeover, which included getting in form — to which John apparently acknowledged that he had gained weight in recent times.
“We gave him a makeover,” Michael mentioned on the Author’s Room podcast. “We reduce his hair, we took the turquoise jewellery away, we instructed him he needed to be rock arduous when he got here again.”
Michael was talking with fellow govt producers Julie Rottenberg and Elisa Zuritsky, and supervising producer Samantha Irby on the time, and after they questioned whether or not that was what Michael had really mentioned to John, he doubled down.
“No, it’s true, I mentioned it to John, John is aware of,” he instructed them. “He was consuming fried hen after I instructed him and he dropped the fried hen on the plate and fell down within the sales space that we have been sitting in and mentioned: ‘I knew I used to be a fatty.’”
However the actor dutifully took Michael’s notes on board, with the showrunner including: “Then he got here again rock arduous with brief hair.”
Regardless of the way it could appear, Michael then insisted that the modifications to John’s look weren’t for aesthetic causes, arguing: “It’s not an aesthetic alternative to return again in another way as a result of I believed he was perfection, it was a narrative alternative. If we’re bringing any individual again we’ve to seek out some technique to convey them again in a brand new method.”
“So right here we are actually, bringing Aidan again once more, and we’ve methods up our sleeve as to how he’s new and what we are able to really do with the storyline contemplating all of the water underneath the bridge,” he concluded.
And Michael’s podcast visitors praised him for the agency stance that he took with John as they acknowledged that historically it’s ladies who face strain to alter their look.
“I simply wish to give Michael Patrick King props,” Elisa started. “You may be among the many few showrunners who really clamp down on males to hit the fitness center and truly put somewhat strain on their look, which most ladies would say tends to fall onto feminine laps.”
Michael responded by referencing the best way that ladies are the extra sexually empowered characters on And Simply Like That and saying: “As I say, we’ve flipped the swap on this present!”
When Aidan’s return was first introduced, not all people was impressed — particularly when pictures of Aidan and Carrie kissing emerged on-line.
The choice to rekindle the previous romance divided followers, with many mentioning that the connection had already failed a number of occasions greater than 20 years in the past.
Others have been upset that Carrie would bounce again to her previous flame after her husband’s loss of life, and that Aidan would let her. One remark learn on the time: “he shouldn’t be going again to her simply because the person she cheated with died!!!”
However the staff stood by their determination to convey Aidan again on the podcast, with Julie saying: “Within the dialogue about bringing Aidan again for Season 2 of And Simply Like That, for me it needed to be about what would actually occur and I imagine it. I feel that’s what occurs after we are older, particularly after a tragedy like Carrie has suffered.”
“Let’s face it, you’ve gotten fewer and fewer actually powerfully sturdy folks in your life who’ve recognized you for a very long time,” she added. “So I imagine that she would have reached out to him.”
