The small screen’s most delightful odd couple is staying put. Less than one month after “Grace and Frankie’s” fourth season dropped comes word that the Netflix series has been renewed for Season 5. Production has already kicked off on new episodes of the sitcom starring Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, Deadline reports.
Created and executive produced by Marta Kauffman and Howard J. Morris, the series centers on Grace (Fonda), a high-strung retired cosmetics mogul, and Frankie, a hippie art teacher. The two form an unlikely friendship after their husbands (Martin Sheen and Sam Waterston) drop a bombshell, announcing that they’re in love and plan to marry each other.
Season 4 concluded with Grace and Frankie moving into an assisted living community despite their reservations. While the show offers plenty of laughs, it’s also one of the rare opportunities to see a nuanced depiction of aging in the media. This most recent season, for example, saw Grace dealing with a bum knee and the insecurities of dating a younger man.
“Women appreciate the honesty of it because they never hear the truth,” Kauffman has said of the series. “No one told me when you get to a certain age, you start losing pubic hair. People need to know.” The “Friends” co-creator called “bullshit” on the myth that there’s no audience for shows about older women. “I think for too long we’ve dismissed women of a certain age,” she observed. “This was an opportunity to say, ‘Hey, we’re alive.’”