Sarah Paulson Might Not Be Coming Back to 'AHS' — But We Can't Wait for Her Other Projects

Will American Horror Story suffer in its ninth season, 1984, without darling Sarah Paulson starring in the slasher-themed storyline? We certainly think so. It appears that Sarah Paulson won't be starring in Ryan Murphy's latest series, though she's had main roles in all eight preceding seasons since the show's inception.

Variety announced the tragic news on July 8, when it learned from various sources that Sarah would appear in 1984 at the most "in a cameo."

But why isn't Sarah Paulson going to be a regular in American Horror Story: 1984? It turns out she's not the only familiar face we'll have to try and enjoy the show without. Keep reading.

Sarah's time on AHS really propelled her career into A-list celebrity, and earned her five Emmy nominations for the roles she portrayed on the show. It also cemented her artistic ties to series creator Ryan Murphy, who also brought us American Crime Story, for which Sarah took home the Lead Actress Emmy for her portrayal of Marcia Clark.

And it sounds like she's got a lot on her plate these days, too much to commit full-time to the ninth season of a series she's been a part of since day one. She's currently filming the FX series Mrs. America, which will also star Cate Blanchett and cover the history of the Equal Rights Amendment.

But that isn't to say Sarah is through with her Ryan Murphy collaborations. The two are currently also at work on a forthcoming Netflix series, Ratchet, which is based on the nurse from Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. And Sarah is also set to star in several film projects in the coming months, including Lionsgate's Run. 

Evan Peters returned for the second season of Pose, but he's going to be stepping down from his role as series regular in American Horror Story as well. And he was pretty clear about his reasons.

"It's just exhausting," he said to GQ about the sinister roles he's tasked with portraying in AHS. "It's really mentally draining, and you don't want to go to those places ever in your life. And so you have to go there for the scenes, and it ends up integrating it somehow into your life. You're in traffic and you find yourself screaming and you're like, What the hell? This isn't who I am."

He continued to say that many of the scenes he was asked to do over the course of his AHS tenure were traumatic. "I was doing this butterfly razor cutting of this poor girl while I was having sex with her," he said. "It was just horrific and weird and sad. At that point, it was season five, and I was more comfortable with the crew, so it's like, okay."

But now, he's striving to find more lighthearted roles that speak to his inner laid-backness, rather than these dark and "disgusting" roles. "It's hurting my soul and Evan as a person," he said. "There's this massive amount of rage that's been called upon from me ... and I'm sick. I don't feel good."

While we're sad that two of our faves won't be making it back for American Horror Story, we anticipate Season 9's return on FX on September 18.