This article lists the cast and characters in the American fantasy legal television series Drop Dead Diva, which debuted on Lifetime July 12, 2009.
Cast + Main cast of Drop Dead Diva Actor Character Season 1 2 3 4 5 6 Brooke Elliott Jane Bingum colspan="6" Margaret Cho Teri Lee colspan="6" April Bowlby Stacy Barrett colspan="6" Kate Levering Kim Kaswell colspan="6" Jackson Hurst Grayson Kent colspan="6" Josh Stamberg Jay Parker colspan="4" Ben Feldman Fred Recurring colspan="2" Special Guest Star Special Guest Star Lex Medlin Owen French Recurring colspan="3" Carter MacIntyre Luke Daniels colspan="1" Guest Star Justin Deeley Paul colspan="2" Cast Notes
Jane Bingum and Stacy Barrett
Character Actor/actress Starring seasons Recurring seasons Episode count Jane Bingum/Deborah "Deb" Dobkins Brooke Elliott 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 78Prior to the start of the series, Jane Bingum was a hard working, intelligent lawyer whose best friend was her assistant, Teri and was often teased by her co-worker Kim Kasswell due to her size. In the pilot episode, Jane was shot by a disgruntled gunman who was angry at Parker for sleeping with his wife. At the same time, when Deb pressed the return button in Heaven, her soul entered Jane's body and she struggles to balance her identity along with the Old Jane's.
When Deb took over her body, she was equipped with all of Jane's legal smarts but none of her memories. Deb/Jane usually avoids suspicion by claiming the shooting affected her memory. Initially, Deb struggled to adjust to Jane's size 16 body by refusing snacks and being horrified when she found out Jane is eight years older. However, she quickly made peace with her new body by updating Jane's wardrobe, eating snacks, and becoming less self-absorbed. She is pleased that as Jane she can make a difference in people's lives.
Over the course of the series, we learn more about Jane's early life: she once appeared in a weight loss commercial, which proved to be embarrassing when the firm was asked to sue the company; Jane was unnoticed in high school and went to prom with a gay classmate; and Jane has an excellent singing voice. Also, unlike Deb, Jane is distant with her parents, something Deb tries to remedy and eventually succeeds with Elaine. As Jane, Deb is passionate in the courtroom and tries to fight for what is right as much as she can.
At the beginning of the series, the only people who knew about Jane's true identity were Fred, Jane's guardian angel, and Stacy, Deb's former best friend. Complications arise when Deb's former fiancée Grayson Kent also comes to work for the law firm. In the beginning, Jane struggled to watch Grayson move on, especially when he began dating her co-worker Kim Kasswell. She was forbidden from telling him her true identity by Fred, who warns her that she is already in trouble for being back on Earth in the first place.
A romance between Grayson and Jane starts to develop but is interrupted when Jane's husband Ethan arrives. As it turns out, Ethan and Jane only married so he could get insurance for his cancer treatments but Jane was truly in love with him and was hurt when Ethan left. Deb becomes surprised when she starts to channel the real Jane's emotions when Ethan returns. However, she soon shows her disgust towards Ethan and tells him to get lost. Jane also dates Tony, a fellow lawyer, who asks her to move to Washington, D.C., with him. Jane, however, turns him down as her life is with the firm.
After Tony moves away, Jane resumes her romantic feelings for Grayson, who begins dating Vanessa Hemmings. In the second-season finale, Grayson tells Jane that he is planning on proposing to Vanessa and wants Jane to be his best man. Hurt, Jane storms out and when Grayson attempts to follow her, he gets hit by a car. When Jane rushes over to him, he says Deb's name. In the third-season premiere, Grayson is revealed to have survived with minor injuries although he has short-term amnesia. Jane agrees to be his best man and gives up any hope of telling Grayson who she truly is. She briefly dates Grayson's neurosurgeon, Ben.
In season three, she finds a new flame in Judge Owen French but complications when arise when Stacey tells Grayson about Jane's true identity and it turns out that Owen's sister Olivia and Jane feuded in college, something of which Deb also tries to remedy. However, the two work out their differences and Olivia gives her blessing to the relationship. He asks her to come to New Zealand but she turns him down to go to Italy by herself. Owen follows her to Italy and eventually proposes. The two become engaged, with Jane not knowing that Grayson has fallen in love with her. Owen has a heart attack and offers to break the engagement but Jane insists on staying together, regardless of his health problems.
In the fourth season, Jane is called back to Los Angeles to help Kim sort out the firm's financial problems and begins planning her wedding. She misses her own mother so she attempts to reconcile with Jane's mother, Elaine. On the day of her wedding, Grayson declares her love for Jane and the two kiss and Owen sees them, which causes him to have another heart attack. Up in Heaven, the real Jane uses the opportunity to press the return button to reclaim a body. However, it is later discovered that Owen recovered from his attack and he and Jane break up.
In season five, Elaine returns announce her terminal illness and reveals that she knows that Jane is truly not her daughter. Jane struggles to get over Grayson and work professionally with Owen in addition with the Old Jane, who has returned to Earth . In the season finale, Old Jane tells Grayson about Jane's real identity. Jane eventually confesses to Grayson, who has some trouble accepting it. Eventually, they do start dating and get together.
In season 6, when Grayson is shot, he plans to propose to Jane but dies in the hospital. He is reborn into the body of Ian Holt, a Death Row inmate whose innocence Jane proves. She helps Grayson adjust to a new life but they face trouble as Owen and Kim are convinced "Ian" is using Jane for her money and Jane is simply rebounding badly. When they confront her on how it can hurt the firm, Jane quits. In the series finale, Jane became an independent lawyer with help from Ian, and buried the hatchet with Kim and Owen now that she had found her soul mate in "Ian."
Deborah "Deb" Dobkins (played in the pilot and flashbacks by Brooke D'Orsay; appeared in 9 episodes). Deb was a self-centered diva who died in a car accident. She was a typical size two blonde with the intentions of being a model on The Price Is Right. In Heaven, she was dismayed to find out that she was a 0/0--someone who wasn't truly bad nor good, just shallow. Determined to return to Earth, she pressed a button on Fred's computer. Unfortunately for her, she did not return in her original body and struggled to adjust living in Jane's body. Deb's image has shown up throughout the series in the form of memories and flashbacks. Jane later learned that a photo of her former life was photoshopped as an internet hoax by a professor's assistant when Jane represented the professor in a trial.
The "Old" Jane Bingum went to Heaven after the shooting and spent the last four years in Heaven unhappily watching the way Deb has used her body. In season 4, she returns to Earth in the body of a recently deceased model named Brittney (played by Natalie Hall; appeared in 3 episodes). As Brittany, she shows up on Jane's doorstep, intent on reclaiming her life. But after seeing the good Deb has accomplished in her body and after the two team up to solve a murder case, the Old Jane gives Deb her blessing. However, she becomes upset when she finds out Elaine died and she didn't get to say goodbye, so she tells Grayson about Jane's true identity out of spite. Eventually, the Old Jane forgives Deb and leaves for Paris to start a new life, encouraged by Luke and her own strict guardian angel (whom Jane briefly sees with Brittney).
Young Deb (played in flashback by Maddie Ziegler; appeared in 1 episode). In the episode "Lady Parts", while Jane represents Bobbie in a case where a dance client is suing her, Jane remembers dancing for her mom as Deb and how she wasn't able to do a dance routine and disappointing her mom. At the end of the episode, Stacy manages to procure a tape which Jane watches with Bobbie and they learned that despite falling down, Deb was able to complete her dance routine. Stacy Barrett April Bowlby 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 78An aspiring model/actress and Deb's best friend who is one of the few people who knows about the Jane/Deb body switch. She is outgoing and sweet, although occasionally shallow and ditzy. Stacy once confessed to Jane that she worried she would be left behind as she is less intelligent than Jane. However, Stacy is much smarter than she appears—she often helps Jane with her cases by noticing small details and is a novice inventor. Stacy has had various jobs throughout the series, including running a small business from her patented inventions, writing a successful fashion blog, and eventually landing a role on a television show.
Stacy is initially oblivious to Fred's feelings for her but the two eventually date but break up when her TV role causes her to act more egotistical and she cheats on Fred with her co-star. When she finds out her co-star was cheating on her, she slaps him and is sued for assault. Grayson represents her and the two kiss while working on the case. The two both realize it was a mistake, with Grayson stating that Stacy just reminded him so much of Deb. Stacy then told Grayson that she's not Deb, but "Jane is." She and Fred break up when he returns to Heaven but she loses her memories of him since he confesses that he is an angel.
Stacy meets a woman named Nikki, who encourages her to open a unique bakery, after Stacy accidentally crossed a pie recipe with a cake recipe. Stacy refuses to listen to Jane's suspicions that Nikki is a con artist and is devastated when Nikki scams her out of her money. Nikki gets caught and Jane encourages Stacy to continue her dream of opening a "pakery" where she will sell "pakes", a combination of a cake and a pie. However, she encountered trouble again when a man named Jonah Pierce claimed that Stacy stole the idea from him. However, in court, Stacy is able to prove that it was her idea and is granted a patent.
Stacy later sells the business to concentrate on becoming a mother via artificial insemination. She asks Jane for permission to ask Owen to be her sperm donor and the two date on-and-off throughout her pregnancy. It is later revealed that Stacy will have twins, a boy and girl, which she later gives birth to just hours before the wedding, which was postponed temporarily until they were delivered.
Jane's guardian angels
Character Actor/actress Starring seasons Recurring seasons Episode count Fred Ben Feldman 2, 3 1, 4, 6 38The angel who was in charge of Deb's case when she arrived to Heaven. After she pressed the return button, he was demoted to be her guardian angel and work as a mail clerk in the firm to keep an eye on her. Fred lives in the Old Jane's apartment as he struggles to adjust to human life.