iCarly's Jennette McCurdy has quit acting and will not appear in the reboot

3 March 2021, 11:53

See the first look at the iCarly reboot

By Katie Louise Smith

“I'm so ashamed of the parts I've done in the past. I resent my career in a lot of ways."

When Jennette McCurdy's name was not included in the cast line up for the upcoming iCarly reboot on Paramount+, fans began to speculate about why she wasn't returning.

Jennette famously played the beloved Sam Puckett on this show alongside Miranda Cosgrove, Nathan Kress and Jerry Trainor, and later went on to star with Ariana Grande in Sam & Cat. Following the reboot news, Nathan Kress spoke a little about Jennette's absence from the show, calling it a "personal decision".

Now, in a new podcast episode, Jennette has explained why she won't be joining the reboot, and also revealed that she has actually quit acting altogether.

Speaking on a recent episode of her podcast, Empty Inside, Jennette said that she decided to quit acting a few years ago.

“I quit a few years ago because I initially didn't want to do it,” she said. “My mom put me in it when I was 6 and by sort of age, I guess, 10 or 11, I was the main financial support for my family. My family didn't have a lot of money, and this was the way out, which I actually think was helpful in driving me to some degree of success.”

Jennette also opened up about how difficult and anxiety-inducing the whole process was for her, and how her mother's passing influenced her decision: "Once I started to get the nerves under control was when I started to actually get some traction, but I ultimately quit after my mom passed away because with her death kind of died a lot of her ideas for my life, and that was its own journey, and a difficult one for sure."

Watch the final minute of the final episode of iCarly

Jennette also expressed how she felt embarrassed and "ashamed" about her previous roles in Nickelodeon's iCarly and Sam & Cat.

“I'm so ashamed of the parts I've done in the past. I resent my career in a lot of ways," she explained. "I feel so unfulfilled by the roles that I played and felt like it was the most cheesy, embarrassing. I did the shows that I was on from like 13 to 21, and by 15, I was already embarrassed.”

While it's likely that we won't ever see her as Sam again, Jennette has been working behind the scenes, trying her hand at writing and directing, and of course, podcasting. She also didn't entirely rule out a return to acting, saying she'd consider it depending on the director: "We'll see where things are in a few years.”