Actors Who Played Pregnant Characters While Pregnant IRL

October 16, 2024

We’ve seen Hollywood handle different situations in varying ways. Some can be handled amazingly, while others are an absolute train wreck. When you’re an actor, life doesn’t stop just because you’re playing a role in a movie or show. Everyone has a life outside of work, and sometimes, actors can fall pregnant, even though their characters are not at that stage of life yet.

So, what do the showrunners do? Well, oftentimes, they hide the actors’ pregnancy with strategic angles and hide their bellies in different ways, especially if the character can’t be written as pregnant. Sometimes, we also get awful storylines where they make the characters arc that they are going through weight changes, like in Frasier, or sometimes they even fire the actor for getting pregnant.

But then there are the times when an actor falls pregnant, and the show or movie decides to write that into the project. It happens more often than you think, and it even happens a couple of times in some favorite shows like Bones. We love it when shows and movies embrace what’s going on in the actors’ lives, and let them be pregnant comfortably on and off set.

From shows like It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia to How I Met Your Mother, and even for movies like Oceans Twelve, there have been quite a few instances where a pregnant actor plays a pregnant character.

See the examples below.

Alyson Hannigan in ‘How I Met Your Mother’
Alyson Hannigan was another star to get pregnant on the show twice. While they hid the first one by having her hide her belly and leave for a few episodes, they embraced her second pregnancy on the show by having her character get pregnant. (Co-star Cobie Smulders was pregnant too but they hid hers).
Hayden Panettiere in ‘Nashville’
In season 4 of Nashville, they incorporated Hayden Panettiere’s IRL pregnancy into the show. Panettiere played rising music star Juliette Barnes, and in season four, the showrunners decided to work with her pregnancy and make a juicy storyline for Barnes where she cheats on her boyfriend and has to deal with an unexpected pregnancy.
Emily Deschanel in ‘Bones’
Emily Deschanel’s character in Bones had not one, but both of her pregnancies written into the show and for her character, which continued her character’s romance with David Boreanaz’s character.
Ginnifer Goodwin in ‘Once Upon a Time’
While Ginnifer Goodwin was also pregnant twice in Once Upon a Time, it was only written once, the first time, to be exact. In season three, her character welcomed a son, and with her second pregnancy in real life, the showrunners decided to hide it.
Molly Ringwald in ‘Secret Life of the American Teenager’
In The Secret Life of the American Teenager, Molly Ringwald played Anne, whose daughter had an unplanned surprise pregnancy. When Ringwald was pregnant in real life, the showrunner didn’t hesitate to make her character pregnant too for all that extra drama.
Lisa Kudrow in ‘Friends’
Probably the most well-known instances of this is when Lisa Kudrow’s character Phoebe offered to be a surrogate for her brother and his wife Frank and Alice in Friends. She was pregnant in real life, and they just ran with it!
Julia Roberts in ‘Ocean’s Twelve’
One rare instance where they wrote a pregnancy into a movie was with Julia Roberts in Ocean’s Twelve, where she plays a non-pregnant wife of a conman but helps in a scheme where she poses as a pregnant Julia Roberts.
Jenna Fischer in ‘The Office’
While Jenna Fisher’s character in The Office was pregnant twice, she was only pregnant in real life once, which they wrote in in Season 8.
Jennifer Garner in ‘Alias’
During the final season of Alias, Jennifer Garner was pregnant so they had that play a major role in that season.
Rachel Bilson in ‘Hart of Dixie’
When Rachel Bilson was pregnant, they wrote it in for her character in Hart of Dixie, but sadly left fans on a cliffhanger for many details about it.
Caterina Scorsone in ‘Private Practice’
So they made Caterina Scorsone’s pregnancy storyline rather tragic in Private Practice. While the actress did give birth to a healthy baby, her character had an unborn baby that had no brain.
Sarah Alexander in ‘Coupling’
Sarah Alexander was pregnant in real life during the filming of the fourth and final season of Coupling, so the writers made it a huge storyline!
Melissa Fumero in ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’
Another instance of an actor being pregnant twice but only having one of the pregnancies be a part of the show was Melissa Fumero in Brooklyn Nine-Nine.
Katey Sagal in ‘Married…With Children’
Married…With Children’s Peggy Bundy (played by Katey Sagal) announced that she was pregnant in season six to accommodate her real-life pregnancy. Tragically, Sagal miscarried, and the writers changed the plotline to be a dream of another character’s.
Marcia Cross in ‘Desperate Housewives’
Marcia Cross, who portrayed Bree Van de Kamp on Desperate Housewives, was pregnant in real life during season three.
Chandra Wilson in ‘Grey’s Anatomy’
Chandra Wilson’s pregnancy was written into Grey’s Anatomy season two.
Candice King in ‘The Vampire Diaries’
So Candice King was pregnant with her first child in season seven of The Vampire Diaries, so for the show, they wrote that two other character’s twins were magically transferred to her character’s womb.
Salli Richardson-Whitfield in ‘Eureka’
You also probably remember that Salli Richardson-Whitfield’s character in Eureka was pregnant, and it turns out, she was pregnant in real life too!
Kaitlin Olson in ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’
It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia fans remember that Kaitlin Olson’s character Dee was randomly quite pregnant in one episode. Throughout a few episodes, she continued to be pregnant, and we later found out she was a surrogate for two other characters, and it was a clever way to hide her pregnancy in real life.
Chelsea Hobbs in ‘Make It or Break It’
Chelsea Hobbs became pregnant in real life while filming the second season of Make It or Break It. While she left the show due to creative differences, Atlantic claimed that her pregnancy was the reason she left, and so they made her character pregnant and leave the town.
Bethany Joy Lenz in ‘One Tree Hill’
Remember Bethany Joy Lenz in One Tree Hill and how her character was pregnant in the show’s seventh season? Well, she was pregnant in real life too!
Katie Lowes in ‘Scandal’
Remember when Katie Lowes was pregnant during the filming of the sixth season of Scandal?!
Vanessa Morgan in ‘Riverdale’
In the show Riverdale, Vanessa Morgan character became pregnant, which accomodated her irl pregnancy.
Jada Pinkett Smith in ‘Hawthorne’
Jada Pinkett Smith was pregnant during the filming of the second season of Hawthorne, and to accommodate this, they wrote that her character was pregnant, too.
Ellie Kemper in ‘Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt’
When Ellie Kemper was pregnant during the filming of the second season of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, the showrunners wrote in that her character was becoming a surrogate.
Tori Spelling in ‘Beverly Hills, 90210’
When Tori Spelling was pregnant in real life, the writers made her character pregnant in the fourth season of Beverly Hills, 90210.
Lucille Ball in ‘I Love Lucy’
Despite the execs not being too pleased about her character being pregnant in the show, Lucille Ball ensured her pregnancy would be written in the show during I Love Lucy Season two, but they couldn’t even say the word “pregnant,” so they had to work around it.