Jennifer Lawrence’s Comedic Performance In No Hard Feelings Pays Off A Role From 16 Years Ago

Jennifer Lawrence’s laugh-out-loud performance in the sex comedy No Hard Feelings paid off an obscure sitcom role that the actress was cast in 16 years earlier. No Hard Feelings stars Lawrence as a desperate woman who agrees to date a wealthy couple’s introverted 19-year-old son to float the property taxes on her childhood home, and her performance has become a hot topic shaking the film industry as of late. Audiences as well as critics have been surprised and charmed by Lawrence’s comedic ability, as it’s not often they get to see the actress so unfettered in her more common dramatic roles.

While fans have recognized the actress to be organically funny and down-to-earth outside of her career, Jennifer Lawrence’s movies don’t include a lot of comedies. Her career has largely obscured her natural gift for humor, so much so that most audiences are unaware that there was a point in time when she even starred in a TV sitcom. Her perfectly hilarious performance made No Hard Feelings a delightful surprise, but it also amplified her capacity for comedy proven very early on in her career.

Jennifer Lawrence Starred In The Comedy Sitcom The Bill Engvall Show

Jennifer Lawrence starred in the 2007 TBS sitcom The Bill Engvall Show as Lauren, the haughty daughter of the Pearsons. The sitcom followed dad and family counselor Bill Pearson as he balanced a career treating families while struggling to understand his own. Lawrence’s role within both the series and the Pearson family was that of the customary teenage older sister, who from time to time would be the ringleader of the Pearson children’s schemes.

Despite lasting three short-lived seasons before being canceled by TBS, The Bill Engvall Show was a critical contribution to Jennifer Lawrence’s career. The sitcom was not nearly as monumental as Lawrence’s critically lauded performance in No Hard Feelings, but it was a massive jumping-off point for the actress’s sparkling career. It wasn’t just one of her first big-time roles, but it inspired the type of actress she thought she would become.

Jennifer Lawrence Believed She Would Be A Sitcom Star

Well before her catalog of largely dramatic roles in the Hunger Games and X-Men franchises, American Hustle, and Joy, Jennifer Lawrence believed her career would lead her into comedy. Her early career consisted of comedic stints like a short part in the waggish police procedural Monk, a very brief role in the TV pilot for Not Another High School Show, and a more enduring role on The BIll Engvall Show. According to a 2017 The Hollywood Reporter interview by Oprah Winfrey, Lawrence stated that she believed the trajectory of her early career would lead to steady stints in sitcom entertainment.

When asked by Winfrey if her life turned out to her expectations 10 years after her debut on The Bill Engvall Show, Lawrence replied: “When I started acting, I was totally satisfied when I was on a sitcom because I had a steady paycheck. And I was like, ‘Maybe I can just find a way to be on sitcoms forever.’ I was totally satisfied and good. I never dreamed that I could have this kind of career.” While she may not have anticipated her Oscar win and other accolades, though, she might have anticipated one day becoming the star of a comedy hit like No Hard Feelings.