Kelsey Grammer on What the Rest of the ‘Frasier’ Cast Thinks About Revival: ‘I Think They’re Nervous About It’
Almost two decades later, Frasier is coming back with a revival on Paramount Plus. Kelsey Grammer will return to his iconic role as Dr. Frasier Crane, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist with a life that could also use some fixing. But it’s unclear if the rest of the Frasier cast will appear in the series. Grammer thinks his former co-stars are “nervous” about the idea of a revival, but he’s optimistic they’ll join him in the end.
Kelsey Grammer on the cast of the ‘Frasier’ revival
The revival was confirmed in February following years of attempts on Grammer’s part. The goal is to get David Hyde Pierce (Niles Crane), Peri Gilpin (Roz Doyle), and Jane Leeves (Daphne Moon) all back on the show, but as of August 2020, negotiations were still underway.
“I think they’re a little bit nervous about it, but I think they’re also really willing,” Grammer told Fox News in an interview published in September. “I think they’re really interested in seeing where we’re going to go. We’ll see, you know what I mean? You never know. One of them or two might say, ‘Oh my God, no, we can’t. We just can’t.’ But I don’t think so. I think they’ll see the wisdom of giving it a try.”
The show will be without John Mahoney (Martin Crane), as he died in 2018. But Grammer has said the revival will address his absence.
“We intend to deal with that some in the first episode,” he previously told WNBC New York.
The revival marks a new chapter for Frasier
After 11 hugely successful seasons, Frasier signed off in 2004 with its main character moving to Chicago — but he won’t stay there.
“He’s going to move,” Grammer told Fox News when asked for details about Frasier’s next chapter. “He’s going to end up in a different place in the end… and he’s going to start what he thinks is one life and it turns into another. I think of him as George Bailey now from ‘It’s a Wonderful Life.’ He’s about to go travel the world.”
“He wants to go see the world and something happens… that pulls him back and he has to live a completely different life than the way he planned,” he continued. “But as a result, he ends up with love and emotional riches, and just a life that is so extraordinary. And I think that’s Frasier’s story.”
Grammer also noted to Collider in a past interview that the story could “be told with or without” the original cast. “But I want them back because that’s what I always dreamed of,” he added. “I thought we should explore all their lives in their third act, and so that is my hope.”
When does the ‘Frasier’ reboot come out?
With the revival still in the early stages, it’s hard to tell when it’ll come out. But Grammer hopes it’ll be here in 2022. Hopefully, casting will be finalized soon, so it can get rolling.
