Beloved Comedian Recalls Being ‘Overwhelmed’ Starring in 1st Sitcom at Age 59 originally appeared on Parade.
As a stand-up comedian, Leanne Morgan is as comfortable on stage as they come, but when her dream to star in a sitcom finally came true, her nerves threatened to derail her.
Morgan, 59, spoke to Variety in a Monday, July 14, interview about her experience as a first-time lead on her upcoming Netflix show, Leanne, which will premiere on July 31.
“The first three weeks, I got those scripts, and I was in every scene, and I never learned a script like that,” she told the outlet. “I didn’t know what camera blocking was. I didn’t even know about lots like to go in and film at Warner Bros. in Burbank, everything was new to me. I was overwhelmed. I’ll be 60 in October, and I don’t think my life is over, but things are a little hard for me at my age. I thought, ‘There’s no way I’m going to learn all this,’ and there was a big learning curve. And then I kind of settled into it, once I got over the shock and the being overwhelmed.”
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Amid her journey to TV stardom, Morgan — whose stand-up comedy career skyrocketed after her 2023 Netflix special, I’m Every Woman — received support from a sitcom legend: Jerry Seinfeld, who has joined her legion of fans.
“He said, ‘I’m telling you, Leanne, you’re going to walk on that set, and it’s going to feel like home,’” she recalled. “And by the end of it, that’s what it felt like to me. He was right.”
Elsewhere in her interview, Morgan explained the thrill of being approached by Chuck Lorre — whose past hit shows include The Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men and Mom — about creating the Netflix sitcom.
“When Chuck Lorre flew to Knoxville and sat on my back porch and held my grandbaby and asked me if I would do a television show with him, the whole thing was crazy,” she said. “My husband sits and watches ‘Big Bang Theory’ every night, all night long. Honey, that’s all he does. That’s his show. … I really felt validated after 25 years of doing stand-up and getting a lot of nos, a lot of ‘You’re not edgy enough,’ ‘You’re too plain.’”
Lorre, for his part, added that Morgan’s self-titled sitcom forced her “to go from zero to 100 and become an actor very quickly. And she did.”
Beloved Comedian Recalls Being ‘Overwhelmed’ Starring in 1st Sitcom at Age 59 first appeared on Parade on Jul 14, 2025
This story was originally reported by Parade on Jul 14, 2025, where it first appeared.
