ever sweeter with each passing season, Netflix’s “Sweet Magnolias” premiered in 2020 and was renewed for season 5 in April 2025. However, as fans who have kept up with the romantic drama’s twists and turns know, the upcoming fifth season will be the show’s second one without one of the key players of the first three seasons. Chris Klein’s Dr. Bill Townsend is Maddie Townsend’s (JoAnna Garcia Swisher) former husband who starts out as something of an antagonist (being in the middle of a turbulent divorce with the main character will do that). While the two later somewhat reconcile, Bill remains something of a pot-stirrer for his entire time on the show.
Considering the role he plays, it’s fitting that Bill’s departure features not one, but two surprises. As season 3 comes to a close, he moves away from Serenity, South Carolina in a bid to reinvent himself. Such a development might have seemed like it left the door wide open for him to return at some point, but that doesn’t happen. Insted, season 4, episode 2 (“Practical Dreams”) bluntly informs us that Bill had a fatal heart attack offscreen.
In an interview with Glamour, “Sweet Magnolias” showrunner Sheryl J. Anderson revealed that the decision wasn’t a case of the actor asking to be killed off to exit the show. Instead, Bill had to die to serve the storyline:
“We wanted to just kind of turn the ship 90 degrees. It was so hard to tell [Klein], because we all love him, and he loves the show. But he understood and took one for the team, because it allowed us to tell stories that we wouldn’t have had had an entrée into otherwise.”
