Netflix has handed out an early third season renewal to their comedy series Grace & Frankie starring Lily Tomlin & Jane Fonda, TVWise has confirmed. 13 episodes have been ordered for the show’s third season, which is expected to debut globally on the streaming service in 2017.
Created by Marta Kaufman, Howard J. Morris & Paula Weinstein, Grace & Frankie focuses on nemeses Grace (Fonda) and Frankie (Tomlin) who find their lives both turned upside down and – to their dismay – permanently intertwined when their husbands (Martin Sheen and Sam Waterston) announce they are in love with each other and plan to get married. The Skydance Productions produced comedy also stars Brooklyn Decker, Ethan Embry, Baron Vaughn and June Diane Raphael.
The third season pick-up comes shortly after production wrapped on the show’s second season, which Netflix ordered a little more than two weeks after the series debuted. At the time, series co-creator Marta Kaufman said “It’s so awesome to do a show on Netflix, because two and a half weeks after we launched, Miley Cyrus does a tweet about your show, and they call and say, ‘We’d like to do a Season 2′”, she said. “So yes, there is a season two. We have Ted [Sarandos, Netflix’s Chief Content Officer] and Miley [Cyrus] to thank.”
This is a rare early renewal for Netflix, who typically wait until some data comes in to make such decisions (though they still refuse to publicly disclose said data). In the past it was only guaranteed hit Orange Is The New Black or shows that were picked up with multiple season commitments (such as House Of Cards or the Judd Apatow comedy Love) that have scored such easy pick-ups.
