Netflix says goodbye to “Grace & Frankie”, its longest running series

After 7 successful seasons, the series starring Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin comes to an end

In an industry eager for young faces, especially in the case of actresses, who also end up being fleeting, it is not usual to find such a successful production starring two women in their eighties, with a long career behind them, as they are Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, stars of “Grace and Frankie,” praised since the series premiere in May 2015.

Last year, Netflix released a surprise preview of the final season of said project, a gift to lighten the wait for fans of what has ended up becoming the longest-running series of those created by the platform, when it is already betting on productions with few seasons and a limited tour.

With the premiere of the last complete season at the end of April, with 12 new episodes, “Grace and Frankie” says goodbye after seven seasons and 94 successful episodes, claiming the position of its protagonists in an industry that does not usually bet on actresses her age in leading roles.

The comedy created by Marta Kauffman and Howard J. Morris speaks of beginnings, of new opportunities, which also reach an advanced age, although the story begins with a farewell: that of Grace and Frankie from their husbands, Robert (Martin Sheen) and Sol (Sam Waterston) of those who divorce after they reveal their homosexuality and announce that they finally want to start a new life together after years of a romantic relationship lived in secrecy.

Along with the veteran main cast, the supporting cast throughout the seven seasons has featured June Diane Raphael (Brianna Hanson), Brooklyn Decker (Mallory Hanson), Baron Vaughn (‘Bud’ Bergstein), and Ethan Embry (Coyote Bergstein), playing the daughters of Grace and Robert Hanson and the sons of Frankie and Sol Bergstein.

Among the supporting actors who have participated regularly in Grace and Frankie are Peter Cambor (Barry), Lindsey Kraft (Allison), Millicent Martin (Joan-Margaret), Tim Bagley (Peter), Peter Gallagher (Nick), Ernie Hudson ( Jacob) or Lisa Kudrow (Sheree), although the most anticipated stellar collaboration by fans of the series takes place in the final season of “Grace and Frankie”. And it is that in the farewell of the series a long-desired reunion takes place: that of Jane and Lily with the singer Dolly Parton, with whom they also coincided in the famous 1980 comedy “9 to 5”, a film from which the veterans forged a great friendship.

The starting situation of the plot does not bode well, but Grace and Frankie end up being inseparable partners in adventures, and also business partners, despite being two women with opposite personalities who have hated each other for decades and who see each other. forced to live under the same roof after the news of their ex-husbands.

The fictional characters say goodbye, but the friends Jane and Lily still have a path ahead of them together, not in vain the series, which began with an episode entitled The End, concludes under the title “The Beginning”.

Both will come together again, this time on the big screen, as protagonists of the film Moving On, a comedy written and directed by Paul Weitz, and in which they will get into the shoes of two old friends who meet again at a funeral and decide take revenge on a widower who hurt them several years ago.