Goodbye and good luck Gil Grissom, addio ciccetto!!!!

The curtain will come down soon.

William Petersen (Gil Grissom) is scheduled to make his exit from CSI: Crime Scene Investigation after the tenth episode of the upcoming ninth season. "The hard part is saying goodbye to the cast and crew and writers," Petersen told TV Guide. "It's the people you've been with for nine seasons. It'll be very hard not going in the morning into one of those rooms and seeing them." Marg Helgenberger (Catherine Willows) said she tries not to think about Grissom's final scene. "That's what everyone is feeling right now," she said. "We've had a lot of changes in the show these past years, and this is a big one. Everyone feels on unsteady ground right now."

Grissom's departure from CSI won't be abrupt. "We've been mapping out my last 10 episodes that will take Grissom from one place to another," Petersen explained. "There will be no brain tumor for four episodes. That's the easy way out. We're trying to paint it as we have done with Jorja [Fox (Sara Sidle)] and Gary [Dourdan (Warrick Brown)]. We're trying to make it as real and close to reality as the show has been all along."

"I'm going to come back and see the guys on set doing episodes I'm not in," Petersen said. "And I'm staying on as a producer. The show is important to me, and I'm not abandoning it. I'm coming back on some level. I just don't know what yet." One thing that kept Petersen on the show for so long was the fan base. "They've been fabulous, stuck with us every year," he explained. "But at the same time, I knew I needed to go do something. I don't want to get to the point where I don't feel creative anymore just because it's comfortable and fun to hang out with your friends."

Laurence Fishburne will be joining the cast in Grissom's place. "The writers are trying to wrap their minds around Billy having a graceful exit," Helgenberger explained, "but also creating a graceful entrance for Laurence." Grissom leaving will "open windows" according to Petersen. "Laurence will come in," he said. "Catherine could change her position. It will be interesting and different."

"The fact that we've done this for nine seasons and still like each other, and still want to work with each other, is an amazing thing," Petersen said of working with Helgenberger. The actress got emotional talking about Petersen leaving the show. "I've been very blessed these past eight and a half years not only to have shared in the success of CSI," she explained, "but to have worked with a man who is an actor's actor minus the pretension, an executive producer minus the superiority, and a stud minus the bulls---. I love Billy...he's the bomb! I know that we will work together again, and not just as Grissom and Catherine."

Evidence is in: Gil Grissom is irreplaceable

‘CSI’ star prepares to head out, but he’s left an indelible mark on the show

“CSI’s” Gil Grissom is one of TV’s rare creations. He’s Joe Friday meets Bill Nye the Science Guy. He’s Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson rolled into one person. Unlike the leads on other “CSI” shows — Horatio Caine in Miami, and Mac Taylor in New York — Grissom is a scientist, not a cop.

He doesn’t get caught up in what might be; he deals solely with what is. His very presence on a TV drama is a contradiction, because he eschews melodrama.

If you really want to know Grissom, examine his office. Notice the radiated fetal pig (Miss Piggy), the two-headed scorpion and the Big Mouth Billy Bass above the door. He’s a man who rides roller coasters after doing his employees’ yearly reviews and spends his free time studying bugs. One of his most romantic moments with Sara Sidle came when the two of them were both wearing beekeeper masks.

If you want a standard dramatic hero, go watch “CSI Miami’s” Horatio Caine remove his sunglasses a few million more times.

Grissom’s role on the show has always been as the pragmatist. While he feels for the victims, most of the time he’s more fascinated by the details of the case. Though he solves “who dun its,” it’s really the why, and especially the how that drives him. He never stops being the most curious person in the room.

Don’t expect a dramatic exit for Grissom. Sure, CBS will promote his eventual final appearance (10 episodes into the season) as though he were about to go sailing off a 50-foot cliff, but that’s not what will happen on the show.

The chances of Grissom being shot, having a mental breakdown, killing someone in a fit of rage or driving into the nearest brick wall are highly unlikely. That’s not who he is. His exit will be natural, impermanent (William Petersen has already suggested that he may make an occasional appearance, and he’s still a co-producer) and provide a gentle farewell to the co-workers who will miss him like crazy.

Grissom has always kept his team, which can get a tad dramatic, scattered and over-involved with the suspects, focused on the evidence. Without him, they will be, in a sense, orphaned. The balance of the show is bound to shift without the fatherly way he guides Nick, Greg and Hodges, or the way he balances Catherine’s emotional empathy for victims. He and Sara were the science nerds. And without them, the show will have to change.

Source : MSNBC

All good things must come to an end.

When William Petersen (Gil Grissom) decided to leave CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, it was hard for his coworkers to say goodbye. "I was an emotional wreck on Billy's last day," Marg Helgenberger (Catherine Willows) told TV Guide. "Actually the last two weeks leading up to his departure, it was hard for me to keep it together. We had an amazing, sometimes turbulent, ride together, and I wouldn't have wanted to share it with anyone else. The King has left the building."

Robert David Hall (Dr Al Robbins) spoke about Laurence Fishburne (Dr Raymond Langston) joining the cast in Petersen's place. "You don't replace Billy," he explained. "Laurence Fishburne is an amazing actor and a joy to work with, but Billy created a Sherlock Holmes for the 21st century. He's a true icon and somehow he avoided the usual divalike behavior that comes along with that sort of achievement. More than anything, he was a good guy to work with. He would hate me for being this sappy, but I already miss him a lot."

"After the very last scene where Grissom leaves the laboratory, I felt a wave of sadness," said executive producer Naren Shankar. "Billy had made us cut the scene where everyone hugs and cries, and I knew it was the right thing to do. It brought to mind an earlier episode when Grissom had said to Warrick [Brown (Gary Dourdan)], 'When I leave the lab, there's not going to be cake and a party.' Billy and I were discussing that line and I said, 'Alright, dude, I know where you're coming from.' Then I reached out and gave him a big hug anyway and said, 'But I'm gonna miss you.'"

It's time to move on.

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation's leading man, William Petersen (Gil Grissom), will be saying goodbye to the series in the next episode, "One to Go". The actor made the decision to leave so he could return to his first love: the theater. "The reason I'm leaving is because I'm afraid I'm becoming too comfortable," Petersen told Entertainment Weekly. "It's CSI — they pay me a lot of money, and I don't have to work very hard anymore. I've got it all figured out. And I just realized, God, as an artist, I'm going to atrophy. You do anything for nine years, it becomes somewhat rote. I didn't want to be on the show because they were paying me money and I liked the money. I didn't want to be on the show because it saved me from having to go look for other jobs. Just didn't want it. It was too safe for me at this point. So I needed to try and break that, and the way to do that, for me, is the theater."

Petersen said he wouldn't miss the show or the character he's leaving behind. "It was a complete life for me that's reached its end, and it's reached it in the right way, I think. So I won't miss Grissom. And I hope that the audience won't miss him either," he explained. It is no secret that Petersen's coworkers are going to miss the actor and his presence in the series. "I couldn't stop crying," revealed costar Marg Helgenberger (Catherine Willows). "It was hard. I'm having a hard time now, because, you know, we had a great nine years together. It's just over. It's the end of an era."

Paul Guilfoyle (Jim Brass) agreed. "I have such a fondness for Billy, but the show will go on. It has to," the actor explained. To keep things rolling, CSI cast Laurence Fishburne (Dr Raymond Langston) as a new character coming in to take Grissom's spot on the team. "This is a man who is in transition," Fishburne revealed. "This is a man who had one career as a pathologist and sort of lost his way. It's not until he becomes a CSI that he finds his real second career path."

"The fun stuff begins when Grissom makes his exit, and Langston comes in as a bona fide CSI," Fishburne continued. The character has some troubles to start with. He messes up a crime scene, and it isn't easy for him to adjust to working on the night shift. While David Hodges (Wallace Langham) keeps his distance from the man replacing Grissom, Dr Al Robbins (Robert David Hall) quickly becomes a friend.

Losing Grissom has created a tricky situation, and some viewers have said they won't watch the show without Petersen in the cast. "I do care what they think," Mendelsohn said of the fans. "But all you have as a writer are your instincts...and we always thought Grissom having a life outside of CSI is where we were going to take him." Petersen, meanwhile, will stay on the show as a producer, and he has promised to return at some point in the future for a guest appearance. "He didn't die in a plane crash, he didn't get a brain tumor," the actor explained. "He's out there."