‘Frasier’ Reboot Originally Had Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce Run a Theater Together

Samantha Bergeson
·3 min read
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The creators of the “Frasier” revival didn’t just have to rewrite the opening jingle about tossed salads and scrambled eggs: They had to toss out the original premise.

“Frasier” on Paramount+ was originally supposed to follow the titular psychiatrist Dr. Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer) and his brother, fellow therapist Niles (David Hyde Pierce), opening a theater together. However, after Pierce opted to not reprise his role for the revival, the series’ premise pivoted.

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“For a long time, the idea was that Frasier and Niles were going to run a black-box theater, like how they bought that restaurant and brought it back to life,” series co-writer Joe Cristalli told Vulture. “But it’s hard for Frasier and Niles to run the theater when you don’t have Niles, so we had to step back from that.”

Co-creator Chris Harris added, “It would be weird to make Niles the new Maris,” to which Cristalli admitted, “we did talk about it.”

To note, Maris was Niles’ elusive first wife in the original series, only referred to and never seen.

Cristalli added that there were many iterations of the “Frasier” revival discussed, including showing the funeral of Frasier’s father Martin, played by late actor John Mahoney.

“We saw the funeral in one version of this show. We were still in Seattle and had the whole cast,” Cristalli said. “One of the jokes was Bulldog walking up to the coffin and being very sad and saying, ‘This stinks. This is total BS.’ […] It would’ve been too hard to have that funeral scene and not see Niles or Daphne. If you’re going to do the funeral scene, you have to see those people. It would’ve been heartbreaking and silly to try to explain it, ‘Oh, Niles is caught in a hot-air balloon somewhere and couldn’t make the funeral.’ It never would’ve worked in the way we envisioned it.”

Harris added, “We did have a whole Seattle first act, but it was right to move on from that and start the way we did. I think everyone felt a little sad that we didn’t give a moment to John Mahoney.”

Cristalli teased that perhaps more cameos from original actors will be in the works for future seasons of the revival.

“We do see Roz and Lilith again this season,” Cristalli said. “If we’re lucky enough, seasons two, three, four, and five is when you’ll see Gil and Bebe Glazer and Bulldog. I want to see Daphne and Niles again. If they want to do it, they’ll be welcome with open arms.”

“Frasier” lead star and executive producer Grammer previously told People magazine that the reboot initially was designed to star the entire original cast.

“For a while we were going to try to bring back the whole cast, the whole legacy cast,” Grammer said. [However,] David basically decided he wasn’t really interested in repeating the performance of Niles.”

Grammer added, “In a very funny way, it just took us to a new place, which was what we originally wanted to do anyway, which was a ‘Frasier’ third act. It’s an entirely new life for him.”

Pierce also told Vulture in June 2022 that a successful revival of the beloved Emmy-winning series “can be done without me, finding new stories to tell, in the same way that ‘Frasier’ did after ‘Cheers.’ They didn’t bring along the ‘Cheers’ gang to make a new show. They popped in from time to time and that was a blast, but there was something else that needed to be said, and it needed to be said in a different way. And maybe they will find that and I’ll be in it, or maybe they’ll find it and they won’t need me to be in it.”

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