‘Cruel Summer’: Lexi Underwood Joins Season 2 Of Freeform Series In Recasting

Nellie Andreeva
·2 min read
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There is a change in the Season 2 cast Freeform’s Cruel Summer unveiled last week. Lexi Underwood has been tapped for a role in the second installment of the anthology series, which features a new cast, a new mystery and a new showrunner.

Set in an idyllic waterfront town in the Pacific Northwest, the second chapter follows the rise and fall of an intense teenage friendship. Approaching the story from three different timelines surrounding Y2K, the season twists and turns as it tracks the early friendship between Megan, Isabella and Megan’s best friend Luke, the love triangle that blossomed, and the mystery that would impact all of their lives going forward.

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Underwood joins previously announced series regulars Sadie Stanley, Griffin Gluck and KaDee Strickland, Lisa Yamada and Sean Blakemore and recurring Paul Adelstein. She replaces Eloise Payet after the character of Isabella was reworked.

Cruel Summer comes from studio eOne and was created by Bert V. Royal. Elle Triedman serves as showrunner. Executive producers include Triedman, Bill Purple, Tia Napolitano, and Iron Ocean Productions’ Jessica Biel and Michelle Purple. The series is distributed internationally by eOne.

Underwood had a breakout role in Hulu’s Little Fires Everywhere. She plays Malia Obama alongside Viola Davis in the Showtime series The First Lady and is in an episode in the Disney+ anthology series, Just Beyond, created by Seth Grahame-Smith, directed by Marc Webb. Most recently, she wrapped filming the lead role in Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum’s Sneakerella for Disney+ which releases in May 2022 as well as launching a new initiative centering Gen Z voices committed to racial justice, called “We the Voices of Gen Z” and formed her own production company Ultimate Dreamer Prods. She is repped by Untitled Entertainment, CAA & Jackoway Austen Tyerman.

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