Christina Applegate Leaving Up All Night: Is It Canceled?

Another day, another lead actress leaving a TV show. Wait, no, that never ever happens!

But Christina Applegate is indeed leaving NBC's Up All Night.

"It's been a great experience working on Up All Night," Applegate said via statement. "But the show has taken a different creative direction and I decided it was best for me to move on to other endeavors. Working with Lorne Michaels has been a dream come true and I am grateful he brought me into his TV family. I will miss the cast, producers and crew, and wish them the best always."

The news is particularly shocking given that Applegate makes up one-half of the show's core couple, along with Will Arnett, and the entire series has revolved around her home (with baby Amy) and work life. The network is now faced with the decision of whether to recast Applegate's role (Ummm...Arnett's character has a mistress? Applegate's character goes out for smokes and never comes back?), move on with a new storyline or cancel the series. We are putting our money on an official cancellation sometime between now and May.

NBC announced earlier that it would be revamping Night by turning it into a multicamera (traditional) format. The show, from SNL alum Emily Spivey, was originally single camera. Spivey announced she was leaving the series last month.

Before the show's debut, Applegate admitted serious reservations in joining the NBC comedy, given that she has just given birth to her daughter Sadie (now 2). "As you saw, that's all the time I got to see my baby today," she told me during a break on the Up All Night set. "And that's it. So that's the part that really still to this day is like, 'Uggggh.'...That was the quality time that we got today, so it's hard. I'll get to see her for a minute here and a minute there, and then it's nap time and she has to go home."

NBC has no comment on Applegate's departure or the fate of the series.