Tuesday, December 5, 2017 — ABC, Screen Australia and Create NSW advise that Genevieve Morris has been unable to continue filming her lead role in the forthcoming ABC TV comedy Sando.  Production of the six part series continues with acclaimed actress Sacha Horler (The Moodys, The Letdown, The Dressmaker) stepping into the title role.

Sando’s Producer Chloe Rickard, of Jungle Entertainment, explains: “Genevieve has unfortunately had to withdraw from the show for health reasons. As a friend and longstanding collaborator of Jungle, our thoughts are always with her and we wish her well with her recovery.”

ABC Head of Comedy Rick Kalowski said: “It’s been very sad to see Genevieve, a superb comedienne as well as a colleague and friend of many years, have to leave the show, and all of us wish her the very best.  I’m incredibly grateful to Sacha Horler, one of the country’s most brilliant actors, for stepping into Sando, which will be her first TV series lead role.  The part of Vicky ‘Sando’ Sandringham has been a hugely coveted one and ABC audiences will be blown away by Sacha’s take on the role.”

Sando will film until the end of the year in Sydney and air on ABC TV and ABC iview in 2018.

This is awful news for Genevieve Morris, and we hope she has a speedy recovery.

Sacha Horler is someone you probably know best from a string of Australian dramas – she first came to notice as the female lead in the movie Praise, and she was in CrashBurn, Love My Way, Offspring and Crownies – but she’s also been in Black Comedy so it’s not like she has zero comedy chops.

Fingers crossed the rest of the production goes off without a hitch, and that the show wasn’t so tailored specifically to Morris’ comedy that Horler can’t make the lead role her own.