Fall TV Blog

How I Met Your Mother star Josh Radnor has a confession to make: After filming 99 episodes of CBS’s hit sitcom, he still doesn’t know who his character’s future wife will be.

“To the people on the street who come up to me thinking I have some kind of secret information about this,“ he said on the show’s set before beginning rehearsals for the show’s 100th episode, “I do not.”

Amidst speculation that Radnor’s character Ted Mosby may ultimately end up with a character played by Rachel Bilson, who will have a guest arch on the show beginning with the 100th episode on Jan. 11, Alyson Hannigan offered her word that the show would begin to make headway towards finding The One. “This is the closest he’s ever been,” she says.

And if the mother isn’t Rachel Bilson after all? Costar Jason Segel offered a casting idea: “I think it would be fun to have Hillary Clinton as the mother.”

But that’s beside the point, adds Neil Patrick Harris. “You can’t forget the show is called How I Met Your Mother … The show is about the long journey about how one finds romance, and how it’s determined to be the long-lasting one through the eyes of these people.” –Lisa Ingrassia

Stephen Lovekin/Getty, David Fisher/Rex

Britney Spears has made two guest appearances on CBS’s How I Met Your Mother, and as far as Neil Patrick Harris is concerned, she’s welcome back any time.

“The door is open for her,” Harris told PEOPLE at an Academy screening of the show at McGee’s Bar & Grill in Manhattan. “We would love (guest stars) who get in the show’s world to stick around if they want to … but I don’t know what the writers have planned.”

Spears played Abby, a ditsy receptionist dating Barney (Harris’s character), but interested in Ted (Josh Radner’s character). Based on some foreshadowing in the script, the pop princess may very well return in season four, says Harris.

“I gave her the address to Ted’s apartment at the end of the last episode, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she showed up again,” he told PEOPLE.

During a Q&A post-screening, the cast reminisced about Spears’s time on set.

“Carter [Bays, the creator] had a great line at the table read. He introduces all the guest cast. He said, ‘And I hope I pronounce this correctly, ‘Britney Spears,’” Josh Radner told fans at McGee’s, the bar that helped inspire the series.

“There were wristbands that we wore on set, so that people didn’t come on to the set. In her world, people go up in the rafters and take pictures,” Harris said.

“We wanted to give her the freedom in a closed environment to be as free to act, and fail, and succeed as she wanted to because that’s the process of doing this,” he continued. “She was lovely, and those two weeks were actually quite swell for us.” – Laura Hahn

INF; Kevin Mazur/WireImage

Britney Spears returned to CBS’s How I Met Your Mother Monday as Abby, the silly-vulnerable receptionist with an unrequited crush on Ted (Josh Radnor). The ratings spiked with her first appearance, so she was quickly shoehorned into this new episode.

The fact that Britney’s second guest spot really didn’t work was no fault of hers. She’s not at all bad at playing clunkily-sweetly dumb. I liked the way she tried to vent her conflicted feelings of anger and love for Ted while lying in bed and staring dreamily at the ceiling: “You know what I hate most about Ted? His stupid hair … His stupid, lame, awesome hair. It’s so stupid and awesome,” she said with a cute, singsong lilt.

But the script was an awful piece of specialty construction. Abby’s reverie occurred in a bed shared with Barney (Neil Patrick Harris), who was also feeling rejected by Ted — as a friend. His and Abby’s mutual annoyance turned them both on, so they slept together.

Then they decided to pose as a couple to annoy Ted. Then Barney carried the joke too far by proposing to Abby. Then Abby suddenly thought Barney really loved her. Then, to get out of the engagement, Barney told Abby that their romance had done the trick and now a jealous Ted did love Abby. And then Abby got this crazy love-hungry Shelley Winters-like gleam in her eye, setting up the possibility for a third guest spot.

Well, that’s a lot to cram into the subplot of a 20-odd-minute show. It would have taken me less time to type out the synopsis of Dangerous Liaisons. The twists felt arbitrary and perverse, even for a so-so sitcom, which is what HIMYM is.

It’s time for Britney to move on to her next cameo project. Ugly Betty would have been a good fit, but Lindsay Lohan is already there. –Tom Gliatto

CBS

Britney’s back — and teaming up with How I Met Your Mother star Neil Patrick Harris.

The pop star has been rehearsing for her second guest spot on the popular CBS comedy — and PEOPLE has an exclusive look at Spears, in character as Abby, back on set.

“I had such a great experience the last time I was on the show that I couldn’t wait to come back,” Spears said in a statement. “I was really looking forward to working with this cast and crew again. Everyone was so nice. Abby is going to have a lot of fun!”

In the episode, set to air May 12, Spears and Harris (pictured) team up to taunt Abby’s former crush Ted (played by Josh Radnor) and show off in front of him as a happy couple.

Plus: Check out a preview clip of Britney on the show.

CBS

Britney’s back!

Production on a new episode of How I Met Your Mother — guest starring the pop star — begins Monday.

In an episode set to air May 12, Britney Spears will reprise her role as Abby, producers officially announced Monday. Titled “Everything Must Go,” the episode finds Spears and Neil Patrick Harris’s character, Barney, flaunting their “relationship” in front of Josh Radnor’s character, Ted. Desperately seeking a response, Barney pops a surprising question to Abby.

Earlier this month, PEOPLE reported that Spears would return to the sitcom after charming the cast and crew. A show source described Spears’s return as a “mutual decision to work together more.”

In a new statement, How I Met Your Mother’s executive producer and co-creator Craig Thomas said, “We’re all so thrilled to have Britney joining us once again. And just to head it off at the pass this time around: Yes, Mom, Britney’s very nice and no, I can’t get her autograph for you.”

Spears’s initial guest turn — on a March 24 episode — earned critical praise and the show’s highest ratings.

Monty Brinton/CBS

For all the warm and fuzzy sentiments about welcoming her back, and even the ratings boost and encouraging reviews that were provided by Britney Spears’s March 24 appearance, there’s one person who can do without the pop star’s return to How I Met Your Mother: the show’s Neil Patrick Harris.

For business reasons, nothing personal, insists the actor.

“I’m in the minority that our show does not need stunt casting in order to succeed,” Harris, 34, tells the Associated Press. “I worry that if they start Will and Grace-ing us too much, that the show will suffer. And we’re all really proud of the content of the show.”

He adds, “I mean, viewership is not our game. It’s the network and the studio’s game, you know. It’s the promotion department’s game,” he says.

Scheduled at the same time as ABC powerhouse Dancing With the Stars, “We wish we weren’t opposite an awkward reality dancing competition,” says Harris. “But we have no say about that. I just am a real fan of our content. I think we have a great show going, and I hope it’s not screwed up by the desire for 700,000 more viewers.”

Actually, Spears helped boost viewership by 1 million — attracting a total audience of 10.6 million, despite the small nature of her (much-publicized) role, as a daffy receptionist.

Among the much-sought-after 18-to-49-year-old demographic, it was the most-watched episode of the series since its debut in September 2005. –Stephen M. Silverman

INF; Kevin Mazur/WireImage

Britney Spears is always welcome back to How I Met Your Mother.

“We always said, ‘You know, if her character pops, we’ll bring her back,’” the CBS sitcom’s executive producer Carter Bays tells the Associated Press. “I thought she was great. I was very proud of that episode.”

On the March 24 show Spears, 26, played at receptionist at a dermatologist’s office, opposite Josh Radnor. Costar Neil Patrick Harris said Spears was “really funny”.

“It was totally weird,” Bays said of having Spears on the set. “I think we have a very, like, kind of Midwestern homey vibe here on the show, and it was strange to suddenly have helicopters circling.” he said.

The episode wrapped up with Spears’s character flirting with womanizer Barney (Harris). The following week, in an episode in which Spears did not appear, a “mystery woman” sabotaging Barney’s usually successful attempts to pick up ladies was introduced into the plot.

Asked if Spears might end up to be the saboteur, Bays replied “Could be. There’s no reason why not” — though he also suggested it could be Spears’s guest costar Sarah Chalke.

So, will Britney come back or won’t she? “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know the answer to that.” –Stephen M. Silverman

Monty Brinton/CBS