With filming now underway on Season 2 of Netflix's live-action One Piece series, we're starting to learn more about what will come next in the critically acclaimed season. Casting announcements have sort of clued us in as to where the series will go in its sophomore season, as we've learned who will play the roles of Smoker, Brogy, Mr 3., Mr. 5, and Mr. 9, among others.
One character we haven't heard much about is Doctor Kureha. Late last year, Jamie Lee Curtis expressed interest in portraying Doctor Kureha in the live-action series. At the time, co-showrunner Matt Owens admitted that they were even writing the character with Curtis in mind for the role.
Unfortunately, it has now been confirmed that Jamie Lee Curtis will not be appearing in Season 2 of One Piece as Doctor Kureha. Speaking to Deadline, One Piece executive producer Becky Clements explained that scheduling conflicts prevented the award-winning actress from joining the cast.
She loves the show. She has too many films and TV shows that she’s going into production on so our production dates aren’t going to work. She definitely wanted to do it but she’s got deals in first position, and it just became complicated.
With Curtis out of the picture, Clements confirmed that Netflix did find "an amazing person" to play the role. We don't yet know how it will be, though.
For those unfamiliar, Doctor Kureha is a 139-year-old doctor on Drum Island, and an ally of the Straw Hat Pirates. She has a pretty big role in the manga chapters that Season 2 will presumably cover.
Elsewhere in the interview, Clements offered an update on the production of One Piece Season 2. They are now three weeks into filming and while they've had a lot of rain, there doesn't seem to be any worry regarding the production schedule.
No, we will absolutely maintain the creative and all the exteriors and blue sky and visual effects. We recently moved something to the interior, and we agreed that in the end, that interior scene doesn’t feel as dynamic as we need it to. We’ll find a place on the schedule when our weather gets better to shoot it again.
Netflix, they understand, they are good partners when we have to make those last-minute decisions. July, August are the tougher months, and we adjusted our schedule so that the majority of our exterior stuff will shoot closer to the end of the year, summer.
Clements also confirmed that filming on Season 2 is scheduled to run into December. No release date has been announced for One Piece Season 2, although it's expected to arrive at some point in 2025.