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CHARLIE Sheen is gone, but his sitcom Two and a Half Men is likely to stick around.
Although the eight-year-old show revolved around Sheen's playboy character Charlie Harper, Warner Bros. Television and CBS have every incentive to try to keep it going after producers fired the star on Monday.
The show, for one, is a huge moneymaker and is currently the most popular comedy on the air, and in syndication. But the more important question might be whether viewers will buy a remade show next autumn?
There are numerous examples of shows losing stars and plugging along with other actors, though not necessarily in the same roles. Just ask Dick Sargent, Jimmy Smits, Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Sandy Duncan and, yes, even Sheen himself.
In Sheen's case, he worked for two years on ABC's Spin City, essentially replacing original star Michael J Fox in 2000 when Parkinson's disease made it impossible for Fox to continue. NYPD Blue continued for a decade with Smits after its original lead actor, David Caruso, decided he wanted to try his luck on the big screen.
Farrah Fawcett-Majors was television's biggest new star when she left Charlie's Angels in 1977, although she made guest appearances afterward. Cheryl Ladd joined the cast the same year, with the show running another four seasons.
Duncan had a tough task in 1987 - Replace Valerie Harper in Valerie. It was eventually renamed The Hogan Family and went off the air in 1991. Suzanne Somers left Three's Company in 1981, and was replaced by Priscilla Barnes until the show ended in 1984.
Each of those new actors played different characters than the ones who left.
Even if Two and a Half Men returns, it's highly unlikely that there will be a new Charlie Harper. The hard-partying Sheen embodied the character; some suggested it was written with his real-life persona in mind.
Viewers wouldn't buy it, said Robert Thompson, director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, US.
"It would be like if your mother said, 'The role of your father is now being played by so-and-so,' and not 'I've left your father and here is my new guy'," said Thompson.
Sheen's fellow cast members haven't commented about the public drama involving their colleague - to the point where Sheen expressed disappointment in one of his interviews that he hadn't been receiving support. He even publicly slated co-star Jon Cryer in a recent radio interview.
However, Holland Taylor, the actress who plays Sheen's mother in the show said: "In my experience, Charlie was cordial and polite with all of his castmates and crew, sometimes even courtly ... and always witty.
"In this very sad and complicated time, I really have no comment, beyond valuing my own history with Charlie."
