And Just Like That has never been the same without Willie Garson as the lovable Stanford Blatch. Carrie’s best buddy and power-playing comrade featured in season 1, although Garson died months before the show’s release.
This week, the series offered the character the heartfelt send-off he deserved — in the most unexpected ways. Even though we haven’t heard a lot about Garson’s character this season, we knew he was still alive in the show. A few weeks ago, he sent Carrie a traditional Japanese kimono. This week, we found out he chose to leave everything behind and live in Japan as a Shinto monk. His surprised ex-husband Anthony called him “God’s concierge.”
Talking on the Max podcast called And Just Like That …The Writers Room, the showrunner, Michael Patrick King, explained why Stanford unexpectedly chose to become a monk.
“After Garson’s death, the show scrambled to explain the loss of our really wonderful friend and actor, Willie Garson playing Stanford Blatch. The thing we came up with is that he went to Japan on a TikTok tour.”
King said, that was a temporary solution. “We skated over it because we had to because he wasn’t in the show suddenly and we didn’t want Stanford to die. We wanted Willie to be alive as Stanford somewhere in the world.”
King said that he did his homework and verified that you don’t necessarily have to be Japanese to become a Shinto monk. What matters is dedicating enough time to it.
