Allison Janney Reveals Her Theory for CBS Canceling ‘Mom’

Allison Janney has again spoken out about CBS canceling Mom, and this time she’s revealed a theory on why the network may have made the decision. On Wednesday, Janney sat down for an interview with James Corden on The Late Late Show and offered a guess at the cause of Mom’s cancellation. “There are so many reasons behind it — most of them probably money,” she said. The actress didn’t linger on the “why” of it all, instead, she expressed how “sad” she is that the show couldn’t get just one more season.

“I wish we’d had at least another year for the writers to have that much time to ramp up to the ending,” Janney said. “We sort of found out sooner than we thought we would hear. We thought, ‘Surely they’re going to want more Mom,’ and they decided not.” She then went on to share how she’s handling the reality of the show coming to a close, and what that means in the bigger picture. “I’m having a lot of moments where I’m just standing on set and taking it in, and looking at all the faces I’ve looked at for eight years,” Janney explained. “All of a sudden, it’s gone. And no matter how much I prepare myself for it, I know I’m going to be just tears, buckets of tears, because it’s just been so incredible.”

Janney also spoke about how she has regularly heard from fans who tell her that Mom has meant a lot to them. “The amazing letters I get from people who are in the program or got sober with us,” she said. “It’s been a great show to be a part of, and it’s so rare when you do something like that [where] it affects people in a positive way out in the world. It makes me sad, but onward.”

While the series will not be getting a full season to say goodbye, Janney did reveal that they are currently filming the final shows and that a big name is penning the finale. “I know that Chuck Lorre is writing the final episode, and we’re right now filming the third-to-last episode,” she said. Lorre is a co-creator and executive producer of the series.

In a previous statement on the cancellation news, Janney wrote, “Getting to be part of Mom these past eight years — showing the laughter, love and hope that can come with recovery — has been one of the great honors of my life.” She added, “I want to thank [executive producers] Chuck Lorre, Gemma Baker [and] Nick Bakay, and all the writers… for giving us these wonderfully flawed and lovable characters to bring to life.”