Tossed salad and scrambled eggs are back on the menu (with a glass of sherry, of course): the much-anticipated Frasier sequel is officially going ahead.
One of television’s most successful sitcoms, Frasier ran for 263 episodes between 1993 and 2004, winning 37 Emmy awards. When it was announced in February 2021 that a sequel was in development, it was revealed that Kelsey Grammer would be returning to the title role and serve as executive producer.
On Wednesday, Deadline reported that a single series had officially been greenlit by US streaming service Paramount+, with an unconfirmed 10 episodes.
The new series will see the psychiatrist turned radio host Frasier Crane beginning the next phase of his life in a new city, having left Seattle, where Frasier was set. The final episode of the original series saw Frasier Crane give up a promising new job in San Francisco and move to Chicago instead, where his girlfriend Charlotte, played by Laura Linney, had just relocated.
The rest of the cast will reportedly feature mostly new characters. Members of the original cast – David Hyde Pierce’s Niles, Jane Leeves’ Daphne and Peri Gilpin’s Roz – aren’t expected to be regulars, though they could make guest appearances. John Mahoney, who played Frasier and Niles’ father Martin, died in 2018. Moose the dog, who played Eddie, Martin’s pet jack russell, died in 2006.
Earlier this year, Hyde Pierce, who played Frasier’s brother Niles, told the Guardian he had not yet heard many details about the sequel. “It’s happening, but I don’t know in what form, and I don’t know when, so I don’t know where I’ll be and what I’ll be doing. I’m certainly interested to see what they come up with,” he said.
Leeves has suggested she will not be part of the revival, telling Entertainment Weekly that she was committed to her role in medical drama The Resident. “I have no idea, but I won’t be leaving The Resident to do that if it happens,” she said of a revival.
Grammer has enthusiastically pursued a sequel for years. In an ITV interview three years ago, he proposed that an older Frasier Crane could be a professor or back in private psychiatry practice. He also suggested the story would be “something that puts him at odds with his brother again” and explore his relationship with his now adult son, Frederick.
In July, Grammer confirmed that they were “in the final stages of the final script for the first episode” for the sequel series, adding: “I’ve had a couple of runs through it, and I cried, so I’m happy.”
