E! Online is reporting that Life star Sarah Shahi and her fiancé, actor Steve Howey (Reba, Bride Wars), are expecting a child.
While Shahi’s reps haven’t commented on the story, the producers on her show, Life, have plenty to say about trying to work around her condition on the show. In it, Shahi plays gritty police detective Dani Reese, partner to the show’s lead character, detective Charlie Crews (Damian Lewis).
Life show runner Rand Ravich told E! that Shahi is, “about four months pregnant” and that her pregnancy “is a challenge,” saying “Episodic television is a grueling schedule, and Sarah and Damian were practically in every scene together, and we certainly can’t expect Sarah to work 15-hour days … So we were able to carve Sarah out of the main story a little bit – keeping her always related to Crews and always involved with Crews – and just give her some relief as well.”
So how will all of this play out on the Life? According to E!, Shahi’s character, Dani Reese, will join a FBI-LAPD joint task force on crime in upcoming episodes in order to “help moderate the show’s demands on Sarah while she’s pregnant.”
These amazing spectacles will probably help too:
Ravich said, “We wanted to diverge their stories somewhat, to separate them geographically to make them start doubting each other, tear them apart somewhat. And then hopefully, if they can work it out, [we can] bring them back together in a stronger fashion.”
In 2006, Mariska Hargitay‘s pregnancy on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit inspired a storyline that sent her character, Det. Olivia Benson deep undercover with the FBI, so maybe shipping pregnant actors/detectives off to work with the Feds is the latest tv trend.
Of course, the impact of Shahi’s pregnancy on Life is small potatoes to some of us who are more concerned with what this means about the actress’s return to The L Word (as beloved hottie Carmen) this year for the final episode of the series.
The news raises some big questions, like will Carmen be pregnant? Will she be rocking some low-rise maternity short-shorts? Will Shane defy the laws of nature and be named the baby daddy?
And, finally, am I the only one who, upon seeing the picture of Shahi and Howey above, thought I was looking at this?
