Hollywood star Kat Dennings is best known for her roles on the CBS sitcom 2 Broke Girls (New York City diner waitress Max Black) and in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Darcy Lewis in the Thor superhero movies and on the Disney+ series WandaVision.
Get ready to see more of the 38-year-old raven-haired beauty. She will star in the upcoming ABC series Shifting Gears with 71-year-old comedian Tim Allen of Home Improvement and Toy Story fame.
In Shifting Gears, Allen plays the protagonist, “a widower and owner of a classic car restoration business whose adult daughter [Dennings] and teenage kids move back in with him.”
Kat Dennings will play Tim Allen’s daughter in ABC sitcom pilot #ShiftingGears. Get the details here. pic.twitter.com/RJHunz5mie
— TVLine.com (@TVLine) April 9, 2024
When Dennings shared the Shifting Gears news with her more than 5 million followers on Instagram, many voiced their disappointment that she will be working with Allen, whose long successful career has seen enough scandal to have articles published listing them.
Allen, who as a young man spent time in prison on a drug trafficking conviction, has in his later years advocated strong right wing views, inviting dissent from Dennings’ fans for mocking so-called “woke” culture and criticizing Disney’s support for the LGBTQ+ community.
One fan replied: “I won’t watch anything with that guy in it. I wish you had a different actor with you on this show.” Another chimed in: “Good luck working with that guy” and another wrote: “You’re so much better than him WHY.” The most liked comment so far is: “Ugh why’re you working with him.”
Shot the new pilot last Friday here on the Disney lot where it all began. pic.twitter.com/QU6hB8Is9h
— Tim Allen (@ofctimallen) June 12, 2024
Another fan who was disappointed with the Allen collaboration is hoping for the best and replied to Dennings: “I hope your role is to put Tim in his place a lot for saying stupid things!”
On another positive note, Dennings’s famous friends and fellow actresses are sending words of congratulations including ABC star Quinta Brunson (Abbott Elementary) who wrote “KAT TIME,” Jaimie Alexander (Blindspot) replied: “Congrats, dude!” and Tia Carrere (Wayne’s World) responded, “Yayy! TV needs you!”
Note: In 2017, after attending Trump’s inauguration, Allen complained on Jimmy Kimmel Live! about being a conservative in Hollywood. Allen said, “You have to be real careful around here or you get beat up. If you don’t believe what everyone believes, it’s like ’30s Germany.”