Why does she have to be replacing someone? The article doesn't say anything indicate she's a replacement. It says her character's name is Charly Burke, that sounds more human than Xelayan to me.
The show has a main cast of eight, it makes more sense to swap out someone for another than it does to add a ninth to the cast. And I made my comment before I learned the character's name, based on the fact Halston Sage and Jessica Szohr appear to be the youngest in the main cast (currently 26 and 34, respectively) making me think someone even younger than Sage would also likely be a Xeleyan. Admittedly, I can't find information regarding how old Peter Macon or J Lee are, but I doubt either are younger than 34.
I guess I can see where you thought someone might leave, but I just figured if she was replacing someone they would have said something somewhere in the article. Maybe they just have enough money now to add a new cast member.
Jessica Szohr's casting was announced months before Halston Sage's departure. Indeed, the first clue we even got that Alara might be leaving were when filming photos revealed Szohr was playing a Xeleyan security officer.
If every one took a paycut, when they were demoted to the internet from TV... They probably have enough left over money to increase the size of the main cast.
I don't really see going to something like Hulu as a demotion at this point, if anything it's pretty much a lateral move.
Grimes isn't being replaced because he was already seen gearing up for season 3 in their little announcement video from a couple months ago.
It may even be the new character is a rank or position that is new to the fleet or ship. Might even be some kind of first contact specialist. Hell, for all we know... Ship's Counselor.
So in S3 the Orville will be sporting a big red star on the hull and The Union is now the soviet union
Season three started filming October 15. It's entirely possible that a theory about Griems leaving can be true. He may have filmed what he needed to and then he's gone and new cast member takes his place. Again, this is just to help the theory -- I am not saying I think it's probably so.
Have they said anything about if the move effected their budget? I'm not just wondering because of the new cast member, but also what we should expect in terms of scale and quality of effects. Sometimes services like Hulu seem to actually give their shows bigger budgets than the networks, but since this is a show that was saved from cancellation I'm not sure if they'd be wiling to it as much money as one of their own big shows.
Scott Grimes is literally doing nothing else right now according to IMDB. Why are people in such a hurry to presume he left the show?
Whoever is earning more, has to pay the other one alimony forever. It's more complicated than that, and you have to be a real jerk, to turn this loophole into a cold war.
Him and Adrianne Palicki got divorced, and so a lot of people think that means they won't be able to work together and one of them is going to leave the show. Kind of makes me think of House a little bit, where two of the actors, Jesse Spencer and Jennifer Morrison, got together while their characters were together on the show, but they ended up breaking up in real life, while their characters were still a couple. I can'timagine how awkward that must have been.
In the end, I suppose it all depends on: - Was the breakup mutual or not - Did either or both take it badly (for whatever reason, justified or not) If the second above is true, yeah, I could see one or both deciding to either leave the show, or ask for accommodation that they don't have direct scenes with each other where they have to have a lot of interaction. It could be they're both fine with the aftermath and have little to no issues working together in a professional capacity; but in the end I suppose time will tell.