Surprise! You Can Start Watching ‘Grace and Frankie’ Season 7 Sooner Than Expected
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After a year-long filming hiatus due to COVID-19, Grace and Frankie season 7 has resumed production.
To keep fans held over until filming wraps, Netflix released the first four episodes of season 7 on August 13.
Season 7 will be the last one for the show—making it Netflix’s longest-running original series.
The release of Grace and Frankie season 6 was bittersweet. When the credits rolled on the last episode, we couldn’t help but feel a tinge of sadness, knowing that only season 7 remains.
But the excitement for Grace and Frankie’s final season lasted only as long as the COVID-19 pandemic allowed. In stride with the rest of Hollywood, the show’s production paused in mid-March for the cast and crew’s safety, per Deadline.
In September, Jane Fonda (who portrays Grace) told Today that filming would resume in January 2021. Unfortunately, that date was pushed back and they finally returned to set in June. That means filming won’t finish until the end of the year, but Netflix couldn’t stand to keep fans waiting any longer, so...
You can watch the first four episodes now.
Martin Sheen (who plays Grace’s ex-husband, Robert) predicted that season 7 might release in two parts due to delayed filming, and he was right. On August 13, Netflix shared a video of Fonda and Lily Tomlin (who plays the titular Frankie) announcing the special news.
Grace and Frankie fans, we have something special for you — four new episodes from Season 7 are now streaming!
And more episodes are on the way! pic.twitter.com/XYPZuvyI9A— Netflix (@netflix) August 13, 2021
“We’ve missed you,” Tomlin began. “But more important. You missed us ... the first four episodes of season 7 are out now!” Fonda joined in, adding, “Don’t worry, there’s plenty more to come. We just wanted to give you something special until we finish the rest of the season.”
“It was between this and the Del Taco gift cards,” Tomlin quipped. “I wanted to go with the gift cards ... I tried people.”
The remainder of season 7 will likely release in 2022.
In an April interview with SiriusXM’s Bruce Bozzi, Sheen said filming—if all goes well—should wrap in November. Depending on how long post-production takes, the remainder of the season could show up in queues in early-to-mid 2022, but there's no official release date yet.
According to Deadline, the four episodes out now had already wrapped filming before Hollywood shut down in 2020.
There will be 16 episodes total—so 12 more are to come.
The first six seasons have all featured 13 half-hour-long episodes. Season 7 is blessing fans with 16, per Variety. It’s unclear how those extra 90 minutes will affect the final storyline, but it’s bound to be good, regardless. When it’s all said and done, Grace and Frankie will have 94 episodes total.
Dolly Parton will make an appearance.
Grace and Frankie provides the perfect opportunity for a 9 to 5 cast reunion with the one and only Dolly Parton, and after six seasons of anticipation, her moment has finally arrived.
Parton herself broke the news in a February interview on Lorraine. “I’ve been trying to do Grace and Frankie for years,” she said in her signature humble manner. “We worked so well together on 9 to 5, it’s a crazy wonderful show.”
It’s never been a matter of if Parton would appear in the beloved dramedy, but when. “We’ve been trying to write me in somehow,” she added. “So when it’s safe for us to actually do a production when they’re back, I’ll probably get around to doing that."
In an earlier interview with Today, Tomlin hinted at the news, hopeful that her friend could join the series finale in some way. “We’ve got a great role for her this time. I think she will do it. I’m just hoping she will,” she said. “And we hope she can do it and we think she can do it by remote.”
Whether the Queen of Country is on-set or somehow dials into filming (will she join one of Vybrant’s Zoom meetings? who knows!), it’s going to be an epic moment. No word on any additional guest stars yet, but one-upping Parton, RuPaul and Nicole Richie will be a tricky task, no doubt.
The original core cast will return.
Although they would probably consider it an improvement, to imagine Grace and Frankie without the constant (but endearing) nagging of their complex children is almost impossible. So far, the new episodes feature appearances from June Diane Raphael (Brianna), Baron Vaughn (Bud), Ethan Embry (Coyote), and their significant others. According to Variety, we can also expect Brooklyn Decker as Mallory to return.
Season 7 will step into new territory.
Season 6 (spoiler alert, if you haven’t finished watching) ended with Robert and Sol (Frankie's ex-husband) stranded and broke after Grace and Frankie's Rise Up toilet exploded and flooded their home, and season 7 picks up as expected. The men move in with their ex-wives until they find a solution, and Grace and Frankie meanwhile deal with Grace's husband Nick's arrest and the casual $50,000 they found hidden in his sofa. It's a very chaotic start to the season, to say the least.
As for the rest of season 7, series co-creator and showrunner Marta Kauffman gave Good Housekeeping some insight in early January before writing the script. “I can’t say too much, but we’re going to be dealing with Robert, Sol, Grace, and Frankie in a way in that we haven’t seen before,” she said.
Grace and Frankie is now the longest-running Netflix original series.
Netflix renewed the fan-favorite show in September 2019, per Variety, making it the longest running original show on the platform. “It’s thrilling and somehow fitting, that our show about the challenges, as well as the beauty and dignity of aging, will be the oldest show on Netflix,” Kauffman and her co-creator Howard J. Morris said in a statement.
Fonda and Tomlin are glad to be back on-set, but sad to see the show go.
The unplanned year-long hiatus was a tough one for the entire Grace and Frankie crew, who think of one another as family. “We’re all very close. It’s a happy set,” Fonda told Today. “I love Lily. When I don’t see her on a regular basis, I need a fix.”
In a joint statement, the leading ladies shared their gratitude for the series and the fandom. “We are both delighted and heartbroken that Grace and Frankie will be back for its seventh, though final, season,” they said. “We’re so grateful that our show has been able to deal with issues that have really connected to our grand generation. And their kids, and amazingly, their kids as well! We’ll miss these two old gals, Grace and Frankie, as much as many of their fans will, but we’ll still be around. We’ve outlasted so many things—just hope we don’t outlast the planet.”
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