The Fosters team looks back on the groundbreaking series 10 years later

It's been 10 years since we walked into the Foster household.

Groundbreaking series The Fosters centered a multiracial blended family and brought something new to the television landscape when it premiered in June of 2013. Created by Bradley Bredeweg and Peter Paige, the show followed married couple Stef and Lena Adams Foster (played by Teri Polo and Sherri Saum respectively) and their children, both biological and adopted. Through this family's stories, the ABC Family drama covered the realities of the foster care system, brought a slew of firsts when it came to LGBTQ representation, and covered ground that few other shows were at the time of its five-season run.

We spoke to Bredeweg, Paige, and co-showrunner Joanna Johnson about the storylines that came from their own lives, finding Noah Centineo, some of its groundbreaking LGBTQ moments, the spin-off that almost happened early in the show's run, and more.

Vu Ong/Freeform/Getty Teri Polo and Sherri Saum on 'The Fosters'

Stef and Lena were a new kind of TV couple

Paige and Bredeweg wanted to fill the void of LGBTQ representation within the world of family drama. They initially thought gay dads could work, but that was seen on shows like Modern Family and Glee. "Then it hit us like a ton of bricks. Almost every lesbian couple we know has kids," Paige explains. In addition to that, Bredeweg and Paige wanted the show to feel as modern as possible, so Stef and Lena were an interracial couple. For Johnson, who has a multiracial family having adopted two children with her wife, there was an authenticity to writing The Fosters. "I related so much to the family. For me as a writer, I loved the opportunity to write about something that was true to my own life," she shares.

Stef being a white police officer married to a Black woman holds a different significance now, but over a decade ago, it was a decision made to take a look at the systems impacting this family. "It naturally became a part of the conversation that one of the moms would be inside the system in some way and you can see Stef bump up against stuff before we were talking about what we need to be talking about in this day and age," Bredeweg explains.

Casting Lena and Stef

Bredeweg looks back on the long casting process fondly after all these years, but has a vivid picture of when they saw the spark between Teri and Sherri as the show's matriarchs. "When they read for the network, I remember seeing the instant chemistry within the first two lines and I grabbed Peter's knee," he recalls. He kept a look at the executives in the room out of the corner of his eye hoping they felt the same. When Kate Juergens, who was running the network and was known for not giving much away, cracked a little smile, they knew they found their moms.

The story of Jude

Initially the character of Jude Adams Foster (Hayden Byerly) was conceived as trans, but the network floated the idea of him being gay, and that opened the door for both Paige and Bredeweg to tap into their lived experiences. "We got to tell a lot of stories about growing up as a sweet, sensitive gay boy," Paige explains. (The touching moment when Jude and Connor touch pinkies while sitting in a movie theater was pulled from Paige's life.)

Jude's first kiss was a major moment for LGBTQ representation on television, but it almost happened earlier in the series. The kiss ended up in the second season, but the creators reveal that they originally wanted it to happen in season 1, but then the network asked if it could wait one year. "It was a good note because we built up to it very slowly," Paige says.

Adam Taylor/ABC/Getty Hayden Byerly on 'The Fosters'

A powerful Jude-Lena scene was inspired by Johnson's son

The Fosters co-showrunner shares that she once saw her son in the bathroom taking off nail polish because someone told him "boys don't wear nail polish," which inspired a storyline for Jude. In a season 1 episode, Jude gets his nail painted by Mariana Adams Foster (Cierra Ramirez) after he says that he likes the color she's wearing, but he gets flack for it at school. At home, Lena has an emotional talk with him about not being afraid to be himself when she sees him taking it off. "That's when Jude started to realize he was gay and I was proud that I could take from my own life and hopefully that helped other kids. We still hear from so many people that the show gave them the courage to come out or parents say they understand better after watching the show," she shares.

Brandon's relationship with his dad hit close to home

A big part of Brandon Foster's (David Lambert) story was his relationship with his own father, who was Stef's ex-husband and an alcoholic. "I grew up with my father, not my stepfather who I call my father, but my birth father struggled with alcohol his whole life," Bredeweg shares. As a result, Brandon figuring out how to care of himself while finding a way to maintain his relationship with his father became part of his series-long arc on The Fosters. The Fosters also touched on dementia and Alzheimer's during its five-season run, which was something Bredeweg's grandfather struggled with later on in his life.

Two steps forward for trans representation

Johnson broached the idea of introducing a trans character into the world after the character of Jude was redeveloped. That's where the character of Cole (Tom Phelan) came into the picture. He was a trans teenager who was in the group home Girls United as he was transitioning, which is where he met Callie Adams Foster (Maia Mitchell). "We found some actresses who were good, but we didn't feel fully comfortable with that and then I remembered my dear friends Tony Phelan and Joan Rater's son," Paige explains. An audition later, Tom Phelan landed the role of Cole. Tom was also beginning his transition journey, so The Fosters captured it for both the actor and character in almost real time. "There was a scene on the beach after Tom had top surgery and he was excited to take his shirt off on the show," Johnson says, "We were one of the first shows to ever do that on television. One of The Fosters' many firsts."

With the introduction of Aaron Baker (Elliot Fletcher) in season 4, The Fosters added another trans character and gave trans actor Elliot Fletcher a breakout role. In the series, Callie teams up with Aaron to solve a murder case and the two become romantically involved. Their romance is short-lived, but the relationship made an impact. "Elliot is such a star. We had all the makings of a great teen romance with a lead who happened to be a trans man," Paige says.

Kelsey McNeal/ABC/Getty Rosie O'Donnell on 'The Fosters'

There was almost an early spin-off

Season 2 of the show introduced Girls United, the group home where Callie was sent as a result of running away, which introduced Tom Phelan's Cole, brought Rosie O'Donnell to the show as Rita Hendricks who ran the place, and nearly sparked a spin-off. "Rosie brought such an interesting layer to the show," Bredeweg says. "There was something about that world that just felt like it lived and breathed on its own." Johnson felt it was too early in the show's run to split something off. If the spin-off existed, then The Fosters may not have been able to showcase Cole and Callie's beautiful friendship or keep the home's presence tied to the characters of the show, which was the case through most of the show's run.

Lena's journey into politics

Paige and Bredeweg initially envisioned The Fosters as a six-season show, and one of the stories that could have continued was Lena's foray into politics. "We were interested in following her story as a state assembly person, but the show ended so we never got to fully explore her going from principal of a school to something new," Johnson shares. Bredeweg adds that while some of it is happening on Good Trouble, it would have been nice to see Stef and Lena continuing to grow their family. "If the show had continued, it would have been nice to have this next generation of their family. It would have been really interesting for us," he explains.

Tackling the realities of the foster care system

"This was the sanitized TV version of what kids in the system go through," Paige shares. He remembers a powerful exchange when Karen Bass (who was a congresswoman at the time) brought a group of kids who aged out of the foster system to set to learn about careers in the entertainment industry during the show's first season. "It was this incredible day where 25 kids spent the day with each department," he says. "I asked, 'Do you recognize these stories?' and one kid said, 'The only thing I don't recognize is that I never got a family' and another kid chimed in to say it wasn't that easy."

Eric McCandless/ABC/Getty Noah Centineo on 'The Fosters'

Noah Centineo gets his start

It took some convincing to get Jesus back on the show after Jake T. Austin left the series. "The network didn't want us to bring him back and I was very upset about that because you can't take him away from his twin Mariana and this show is about family," Johnson recalls. So, Johnson, Paige and Bredeweg pushed to have someone new play the character.

Johnson recalls Noah Centineo, years before To All The Boys I've Loved Before would launch his career, coming into the audition with his skateboard and a lot of charm. "It was a no-brainer that he would be perfect," she says. The audience would just have to wrap their heads around the growth spurt he had while at wrestling camp given the height difference between Austin and Centineo. Bredeweg says Centineo felt like family from the moment he sat down with them. They all loved how he stepped into the role and made it his own without mirroring what Austin did previously. "There's fireworks around the guy and his aura is massively bright," he says, "It was really magical to see someone with that confidence and that just settled into this family."

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