Beth Behrs Set for ‘2 Broke Girls’ Reunion With Kat Dennings on ‘Shifting Gears’
Sitcom reunions have become something of a specialty for ABC’s ‘Shifting Gears,’ which has spent its short run finding creative ways to bring back familiar TV faces from its cast’s past. Tim Allen’s connection to ‘Home Improvement’ and ‘Last Man Standing’ already provided the show with its first wave of nostalgic guest appearances back in Season 2.
Now the series is turning its attention to co-star Kat Dennings’ own sitcom history. Dennings has led ‘Shifting Gears’ since its 2025 debut as Riley Parker, the estranged daughter of Allen’s widowed classic car shop owner, but before this role, she was best known for her six-season run on CBS’s ‘Two Broke Girls’ alongside co-star Beth Behrs.
That earlier partnership is officially getting a reunion. According to Variety, Beth Behrs is set to guest star in the upcoming third season of ‘Shifting Gears,’ marking the first time she and Dennings will share a screen together since ‘Two Broke Girls’ ended nearly a decade ago.
Behrs will appear as Dr. Johnson, described as a beautiful emergency room doctor who treats Dennings’ character, Riley, for a back injury. The role also reunites Behrs with showrunner and executive producer Michelle Nader, who previously worked alongside her as a co-showrunner and executive producer during ‘Two Broke Girls” original run.
According to TVLine, the reunion had been quietly in the works for some time, with Nader expressing interest in bringing Behrs onto the show as far back as October 2025. Scheduling proved to be the biggest hurdle, since both ‘Shifting Gears’ and Behrs’ previous series, ‘The Neighborhood,’ taped on the same night at different Los Angeles studios, making it difficult to coordinate her appearance until now.
Dennings herself teased the announcement ahead of time on social media, sharing a cryptic post referencing a diner guest check with a hidden message hinting at Behrs’ involvement, a playful nod to the pair’s shared history playing waitresses on ‘Two Broke Girls.’
This marks the second major cast reunion ‘Shifting Gears’ has orchestrated since its launch. Season 2 previously brought back several of Allen’s ‘Home Improvement’ co-stars, including Patricia Richardson, Richard Karn, and Debbe Dunning, who appeared as members of a grief support group alongside Nancy Travis, another Allen collaborator from ‘Last Man Standing.’
‘Shifting Gears’ follows Allen’s character Matt, a stubborn widowed classic car restoration shop owner whose life is upended when his estranged daughter Riley and her kids move in with him. The returning cast for Season 3 includes Seann William Scott, Daryl “Chill” Mitchell, Maxwell Simkins, and Barrett Margolis, with Dennings also serving as a producer on the series.
Produced by 20th Television, Season 3 is set to premiere in early 2027 as part of ABC’s midseason lineup. That timing places it among several other ABC dramas and comedies delaying their returns until next year, though casting news like this reunion is already giving fans plenty to look forward to in the meantime.
For longtime fans of ‘Two Broke Girls,’ which ran on CBS from 2011 to 2017, seeing Dennings and Behrs reunited on screen carries genuine nostalgic weight, even in a completely different show and format. Behrs went on to spend eight seasons on ‘The Neighborhood’ following her time as Caroline Channing, while Dennings pursued other projects including ‘Dollface’ and ‘WandaVision’ before landing her current role.
With an exact episode air date still unannounced, fans will have to wait until ‘Shifting Gears’ returns to see the two former co-stars share a scene again.
Are you excited to see Kat Dennings and Beth Behrs reunite on Shifting Gears?
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