Kelsey Grammer Reveals Tim Allen And Roseanne Barr Inspired Him To Revive ‘Frasier’

Opinion

The legendary actor Kelsey Grammer, who has long been one of the only openly Christian stars in Hollywood, is crediting Roseanne Barr and Tim Allen with inspiring him to reboot his iconic sitcom “Frasier.”

Grammer Talks ‘Frasier’ Reboot

Grammer originated the character of Dr. Frasier Crane on “Cheers” from 1984 until 1993, and he then reprised the character on the sitcom “Frasier” from 1993 until 2004. Nearly two decades later, Grammer rebooted “Frasier,” and it premiered back in October.

“I wanted to prove to myself and to other people, of course, that Frasier was still interesting and still watchable and still funny,” Grammer told Fox News. “Those were important parts of it. But also, I thought there were more stories to tell about this character because there’s more stories to tell in our own lives.”

Grammer then brought up Allen as a source of inspiration for this revival.

“The fact that Tim was still on a show and then started another show, ‘Last Man Standing,’ I thought, ‘Son of a gun. He knows how to do it, man,’” Grammer said. “He’s one of the funniest guys I’ve ever met in my life. He and Robin Williams. Those are the two — I think the two funniest people ever lived. And I consider that high praise, indeed.”

“And I would lavish Tim in praise,” he added. “I would. I think he’s just a magnificent character and person and performer and comedian.”

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Grammer Praises Barr

Grammer also credited Barr, who brought back her legendary sitcom in 2018, with inspiring him to do this reboot.

“I was surprised that show lit up the way it did,” Grammer said of this. “But, you know, she’s an extraordinary person.”

Grammer went on to say that Barr “ran into a little bit of trouble,” but added that “life happens.”

“Maybe we’re a little silly about all this stuff,” he said. “But she is a great exemplar of comedy, of an ability to make people laugh, that you still think, ‘You know what, people always want to laugh.’”

“And so I started to think, ‘Yeah, it’s time.’ Frasier certainly is as interesting as the Roseanne character or any number of other shows. And I thought, we can find a way for this to happen,” he continued. “And we had a sort of ripe field to harvest as we always thought it would be a reflection of the relationship between me and my father, between me and my son. So that was always going to bookend things. And that was the foundational principle we talked to other writers about.”

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Grammer Wants ‘Frasier’ Reboot ‘To Be Kind Of Fun’

Grammer ultimately decided to team up with showrunners Joe Cristalli and Chris Harris to reboot “Frasier.”

“They have a kind of silliness that I liked,” he said. “I was even drawn to it more because I thought — because in the past we had a kind of sense of how important we were and stuff. I thought, ‘You know, maybe we maybe don’t need to be so important. Maybe we just need to be kind of fun.’ And I think that… we’ve achieved that.”

“When we quit doing the show in 2004, there was some talk of maybe doing another year or two, but the writers’ contracts had lapsed and the studio wasn’t interested in renegotiating because it was already kind of expensive,” Grammer added. “So I think that’s why they let it go.”