Dan Bucatinsky on Reviving 'The Comeback' for Season 3

Adam RatheSun, April 5, 2026 at 3:00 PM UTC

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Dan Bucatinsky on Reviving The ComebackCourtesy HBO

Initially, The Comeback only lasted one season. After it premiered in 2005, the HBO series about a fading sitcom star who lands a new network gig and a reality show about the experience wasn’t picked up for additional seasons. But something funny happened; the series, which starred Lisa Kudrow (who, along with Michael Patrick King, created The Comeback) as the big-hearted, somewhat bumbling actress Valerie Cherish, developed a cult following and in 2014, a second season—this time framed as documentary footage from Valerie’s turn in a prestige drama—aired. Now, more than a decade later a third (and, so they say, final) season of the smart, cringe-inducing comedy is back on the air with eight episodes that follow Valerie as she stars in network TV’s first sitcom written by AI.

Valerie, of course, doesn’t do it alone. Like any star, she’s at the center of her own universe with various planets orbiting around her, and since the first season one of the most stalwart has been Billy Stanton, Valerie’s second-rate publicist turned manager. He has anger issues and questionable skills for a communications professional, but the two of them feel right together. It’s perhaps no wonder because Dan Bucatinsky, who plays Billy and is also an executive producer of the series, is a longtime friend and producing partner of Kudrow. Here, he talks to T&C about what’s changed for Billy and what never will.

Dan Bucatinsky as Billy Stanton on the third season of The Comeback, airing now on HBO.Courtesy HBOThis is the third season of The Comeback in 21 years, and both the second and third seasons have been a bit of a surprise. How did this one come to be?

Season two was more of a surprise. We were canceled in 2005; it was very upsetting because we had expected to keep going. And then years passed and the show developed a following, so season two emerging was a delightful surprise. Then the ending of two was so beautiful and felt complete, like Pinocchio becoming a boy—reality changed completely in terms of the way we see Valerie Cherish. Then, just before the pandemic, the chatter started again. Every time we were doing press for anything, people were asking, “Any thoughts on a third season of The Comeback?” The answer I always would give was, “You never know,” because it's true. There were no plans to do a third season, but every time Lisa and I or Lisa and Michael would have lunch, the conversation would veer towards, what do you think Valerie's doing right now?

Then, a few years ago, Lisa said to Michael, “It would've been so fun see Valerie capitalizing on, or at least commenting on, the strikes.” That led to them having a conversation about AI, and a moment when the two of them wondered, can you imagine if a Valerie is in the first-ever sitcom written by AI? Once that had been said out loud, it was like, we have to do it.

Did you feel about Billy the way Lisa did about Val? Did you see things happening in the world and think about how he’d react?

You know from season two that he gets fired a lot when clients land in a bigger pool, and I think underneath the surface of the anxiety, rage, and social climbing, he had been living with the question of when the light was going to shine on him. His rageful intensity has an opportunity to evolve in this season as he and Valerie become producing partners and executive producers on that new series. It means so much to him.

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Buctainsky, an Emmy Award winner for his work on Scandal, doesn’t just star on The Comeback, he’s also an executive producer.Luke FontanaBut then he’s not always so interested in the actual work of the job.

In this week’s episode, he misses a table read because he hadn’t gotten the parking spot he believes he deserves. How much more do you ? Not to mention, he’s probably spending his entire fee on his wardrobe; wearing Thom Browne head to toe can cost a fortune. Billy is really invested in the perception of who he is, and that starts to take on a more important role in the show. For me, as someone who is a producer as well as a writer and actor, it’s so ingrained in me to want to do a good job, so playing Billy who is, let’s say, shirking his responsibilities, is so counterintuitive. On one hand, it was fun, but on the other it was like, Get your shit together, Billy!

Since his work ethic is so different from yours, is there pleasure in getting to act out the behavior you’d never allow in your own life?

To some degree, yes. This one's a little different because I love Valerie, but when I come on set and Lisa puts that wig on and we're in a scene together, there's a lot of conflict between Valerie and Billy in all of season three. That's hard for me. The part of it that was really fun for me was the fashion; I love fashion, but I don't really, in real life, explore that side of me—partially for financial reasons, and partially because I just am busy.

John Melfi, Dan Bucatinsky, Lisa Kudrow, and Michael Patrick King at the premiere of the third season of The Comeback.Kevin Winter/GA - Getty ImagesWas there anything you wanted for Billy that just didn’t end up making it into this season?

The truth of the matter is we only see the world through Valerie Cherish's eyes, that is the premise of the series. It would have been fun to have a delicious little side story, but Billy’s basically becoming Valerie Cherish in a version of her reality show in his own mind, so he’ll be followed by his own camera crew through the world.

How much of the really specific behavior of the characters—like the voice memos that Billy insists on sending this season instead of texting—are rooted in real observations life in the entertainment industry?

It's not mean because I think the characters are guilty of everything at which we’re poking fun, but you can tell these are real things. People who work in entertainment are going to watch this and be like, “Oh, man, I'm guilty of that.”

People might be more careful around you in the coming weeks.

We're not writing an additional episode, so everybody can relax.

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”