This CHEERS Actor Apologizes for 30 Years of ‘Missed’ Friendship with Co-Star
Movieguide® Contributor
CHEERS actor Ted Danson is fessing up about his friendship mishaps.
On one of his recent podcast episodes, the actor welcomed his former CHEERS co-star, Kelsey Grammer, who says he “missed out” on a friendship with.
“This isn’t self-deprecating, but I wish — I feel like I got stuck a little bit with you during the CHEERS years. I have a memory of getting angry at you once,” Danson told Grammer.
“Yeah, you came and told me that one day,” Grammer said.
Neither of them forgot that negative day.
“It’s stuck in both of our memories,” Danson said. “But I feel like, —-, I don’t know. I missed out on the last 30 years of Kelsey Grammer, and I feel like it’s my bad, my doing, and I almost feel like apologizing to you.”
“I apologize to you and me that I sat back, you know, and didn’t. I really do apologize,” Danson added.
CHEERS ran from 1982 to 1993 and had 11 seasons. Grammer came onto the show in 1984. Danson was part of the original cast, so he and Grammer worked together for nine years straight.
Though they had their squabbles, Grammer still appreciated Danson for the advice he’d given him.
“When I turned 40, you came up and said, ‘You know what it means, don’t you? Now that you’re 40, it means you’re finally worth having a conversation with,’” Grammer recalled.
“That was ——- brilliant,” Grammer added. “I always loved that. And I thought about it, and I’ve repeated it. My love for you has always been as easy as the day. You know, as easy as the sunrise.”
“Mine too,” Danson agreed. “What an amazing thing that we, that time we all spent together. You can go off in different directions, you can have different lives, but that bond, that love of making something really funny and really good and cracking each other up and going through life and still showing up. Like Jimmy [CHEERS director James Burrows] said, ‘I don’t care what you crazy people do during the week. Just show up on shoot night and be funny.’”
The two happily continued talking about the old days and working with Burrows.
“He recently said, we were doing an interview together and he said, ‘You got to have an oar in the water,'” Danson recalled of Burrows. “I’d never heard him express this before, but he said, ‘As long as everybody’s got their oar in the water and they’re pulling, then I’m happy.’ I thought, ‘Yeah, makes a lot of sense.’ And we’re still working together. I mean, he’s done, you know, he does four shows in the last bunch and it’s been great working with him.”
CHEERS has gone on to be considered one of the most popular shows of all time, but the cast pointed out that the success didn’t come right away…
The CHEERS cast recently reunited in January at the 75th annual Primetime Emmy Awards. Rhea Perlman, John Ratzenberger and George Wendt were there, along with host Anthony Anderson.
“Anthony, thank you for getting us all here,” Danson said. “Ah, this feels so nice to be here in front of all of you, Thank you.”
“Ted, don’t you just think about it as a long overdue class reunion, huh?” Ratzenberger said. “Being together brings back some great memories from a show we’re all very proud of.”
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