The Real Reason Lisa O'Hare Left New Amsterdam
If you're among the many TV fans who tuned into NBC's medical drama "New Amsterdam" during its early days, you were no doubt stunned by the tragic events that led to the demise of Dr. Max Goodwin's (Ryan Eggold) beloved wife Georgia (Lisa O'Hare), which began in the Season 1 finale when her ambulance crashed on the way to the hospital shortly after she gave birth to their daughter. To the utter devastation of "New Amsterdam" fandom, the series' Season 2 opener confirmed Georgia succumbed to injuries during the crash, effectively ending O'Hare's time on the show.
Georgia, of course, turned up a few more times in Season 2 when Max imagined her as he struggled to let her go, but O'Hare's tenure officially ended with the season's ninth episode, leaving fans to wonder why she would leave "New Amsterdam" just when the show was taking off. It turns out, Georgia's early exit was always part of the narrative equation, with showrunner David Shulner confirming in a 2019 TV Line interview he'd been plotting it since day one, stating, "Well, it's something I was kind of trying to set up in the pilot episode."
Despite Shulner's plans, O'Hare was such a joy on set, he claims he almost changed his mind. "As we started talking about our season finale, I chickened out, and I decided we're going to keep Georgia, because I love Lisa O'Hare," he said, before admitting "New Amsterdam" executive producer Peter Horton eventually convinced him to follow his original vision.
Lisa O'Hare has kept quite busy since leaving New Amsterdam behind
Continuing to discuss Lisa O'Hare's shocking "New Amsterdam" exit, David Shulner admitted to TV Line that the process was a grueling one. "And so we did it, and it was horribly painful to do in the room as we broke the episode, it was horrible as we wrote the episode, and it was horrible for everyone shooting the episode," he said. "It really was like a death." As you would expect, fans of the series were every bit as shaken when the fateful Season 2 premiere debuted.
Though she was no doubt bummed to be out of a steady gig, it appears O'Hare took her "New Amsterdam" exit in stride. In fact, she's kept herself busy in the years since, booking work on some of the biggest hits in the streaming realm. That includes a three-episode arc on "The Good Wife" spin-off "The Good Fight," where O'Hare portrayed an insufferable, gate-keeping secretary at the dubious STR Laurie law firm. The actor followed that role by playing seriously sketchy foster parent Clarice Farrell in a pair of Season 1 episodes for the lauded adaptation of Neil Gaiman's DC comics series "The Sandman."
Most recently, O'Hare shared the screen with Jenna Ortega in Tim Burton's smash-hit fantasy series "Wednesday." O'Hare appeared in the show's third episode as Mistress Arlene, Wednesday Adams' role-playing boss at Pilgrim World. One would hardly call it a major role, but O'Hare wholly devotes herself to playing the part of a 17th Century villager — right up until her final scene in which Mistress Arlene hilariously breaks character.