With just four words, Peri Gilpin barged back into the world of Frasier: “You look like crap.†Frasier, of course, was the one who looked like crap. Roz Doyle was radiant. At the end of ten episodes, the sitcom reboot actualized her return with a surprise Christmas Eve visit arranged by Frasier’s son Freddy. (Only Gilpin and Bebe Neuwirth as Lilith have thus far reprised their roles from the original series.) “He said you were down,†Roz explains to the morose Ivy League professor, “and you could really stand to see an old friend.†Despite the passage of time and geographic distance, Frasier implies the KACL alums have remained as chummy as ever. The duo convene at a local bar to toast Martin Crane, who died in the weeks leading up to the events of the premiere episode. Frasier, in particular, is taking the Christmas holiday hard without him. “I bet he’s up there right now smiling ear to ear watching the two of you together,†Roz says, “and laughing his ass off at how stupid your party went.†Oh, did we mention Frasier threw a disastrous holiday dinner party? Tradition calls for it.
Gilpin began playing Roz in 1993, and the original run’s 11 seasons established the character as a sex-positive feminist icon in the sitcom canon. Gilpin is still processing that legacy all these years later — though she wouldn’t have minded a few additional peeks behind Roz’s curtain in the style of a much different NBC leading lady.
What compelled you to revisit Roz after all this time away?
I love the character and always have. There’s a lot of unexplored parts of her life. She’s been a single parent for all of these years and has worked really hard to create a place for herself in her profession. There’s a lot of stories there. I know Kelsey wanted to tell them. The way I came into the story was exciting to me, and I felt really good about it.
What unexplored facets of Roz’s life would you have liked to see?
I would’ve loved to have seen her dating life rather than just talking about it. It would be fun to learn more about her ups and downs, especially diving into single parenthood. I used to bring that up to the writers: “Can’t we see all of this happening?†And they’d respond, “Oh my God, no.†You know that great scene in 30 Rock when Jon Hamm’s character sees Liz Lemon on the toilet? That’s what I was talking about with Roz! Those kinds of great dating stories. But I also respected that they were off-camera. Sometimes leaving things to the imagination of the audience is the best thing you can do. The Frasier writers were wizards at that.
Did the writers ever give you a reason for not wanting to portray Roz’s dating life?
I got the sense that it was like Maris. Roz’s romantic life was so epic that you didn’t want to spoil it by actually showing it. Also, the show was called Frasier, not Roz.
It’s funny you mention 30 Rock — there’s this pithy Roz joke from the show that I often think about. Jack is giving Liz feedback about her talk show and remarks, “We’ve done some focus testing, and I haven’t seen such a unanimously negative response since the Frasier spinoff Hey, Roz.â€
Yes, there you go. I was on a fucking plane when I saw that! I was laughing my head off at everything about the show, and that came up, and I remember just going, Aw. But it was very funny. It’s a hilarious show, and they didn’t make a wrong step. I wasn’t surprised to hear that joke.
It got me thinking about whether there was much truth to the joke.
That’s what I found funny about it. Yes, I think Jack Donaghy would hate Roz. I understand it, and that’s okay. Not everyone likes all characters. When people would recognize me during those original Frasier years, I never got anything negative. I got a lot of, Oh my God, it’s Roz! They felt like they could come up and talk to me. My only hesitancy about it was I’m not that funny and I’m not that quick. I think people thought I was the character. Guys were a little worried about me. Oh, here’s a sure thing, but wait, I don’t think I can take what she’s gonna do to me — like with my comments and my smart-ass-ness. That wasn’t a bad thing. It was just interesting.
Since then, I’ve seen so many young women on social media, and a lot of journalists, talk about how Roz was a feminist icon. The term became so popular over the past ten years. It wasn’t being used back then. It was just the way Roz was. She’s everything I would’ve dreamed of playing. I grew up in Texas, and I was raised to behave one way. I didn’t go out of the house without a full face of makeup until I was 21 years old. I came from a whole different background. Anytime I was confused, I based Roz on a close friend of mine who was a very northeastern woman. That was the most freeing experience ever.
A friend recently told me there’s no other sitcom character of the time period she so strongly relates to, which made me realize it’s the same for me. Roz’s balance of a career and an unabashed personal life is so contemporary. What do you make of that?
I think of the women in the writers’ room who were writing their fantasy character and how lucky I was that I got to play her. They found challenges for Roz. I wanted to do so much more, but I also knew Roz was one of those characters where just a dab will do you. A little bit went a long way, and that’s because they gave the character so many wonderful attributes. I love that she got pregnant by a young guy and said, “Hey, listen, I want to do this myself. Go back to college.†As funny as that is, Roz does the things you hope to have the guts to do if you were in the same situation.
The only thing I didn’t like about your appearance in the reboot was how short it was, especially compared to Bebe Neuwirth’s episode-long homecoming as Lilith. How did you and the writers land on this particular return for Roz? Were any other scenarios explored?
Nothing else was explored with Roz, but I loved where Kelsey and the writers were coming from. When they said, “Do you want to come back?†I had to know what the story was first. And they said, “Well, Freddy gives you to Frasier for Christmas.†And I was like, “Oh, I love that, I’m in!†We had lots of conversations. I loved that Roz has a friendship with Freddy because it makes me think of my own daughter. My favorite part of playing Roz was this incredible friendship that developed between her and Frasier. The episode really spoke to that.
It was immediately established that Roz and Frasier’s friendship never wavered despite the passage of time. What else was essential for you to convey between them?
In my mind, they’ve absolutely kept in touch over the two decades, have been great friends, and have maybe tried to work together again. Mind you, Roz was a single parent in a city where she probably needed to stay put. I think they kept missing each other: “Hey, can you come do this?†“No, I can’t, I’ve got this going on.†It’s always a timing issue. It’s the kind of thing actors go through all the time with other directors or actors they want to work with. I have a feeling she loved watching Frasier’s show and giving him some grief for it. Calling him up and going, “What in the name of God is going on over there now?â€
How did you envision Roz’s life progressing between the two shows? We didn’t hear about any personal details besides her daughter’s romantic relationship.
We left her as a station manager and I think it was a great move for her. I would imagine it got pretty boring after a while. I have a feeling people in those jobs bounce around a bit. I’m sure her first task was replacing Frasier. How do I find somebody who can do a show this popular? I’m sure she decided not to try to replace him with another call-in show because it would be an impossible task, so she found a brilliant person to do something else. Over the years, I’m sure Gil Chesterton and Bulldog wanted bigger shows and she helped develop them. Maybe she went into one of her own. I know she had that dream. She ultimately left the station manager job at some point. There was a real slump in radio for a while. Something tells me she created the biggest crime podcast of all time in Seattle and got into that groove, and Alice helped her think about what younger people would want to listen to. Roz spent the last 20 years having to grow and change and mutate herself. The businesswoman of today is very different from the businesswoman we last saw.
Also, Roz was always happy for her daughter to take up a lot of her time. I like to think Alice got to know her own father and his side of the family, but there were some uncomfortable conversations about the situation: “Seriously, what were you thinking, Mom?â€
Did you and Lisa Kudrow ever have a laugh about how she was fired as the original Roz?
Yeah, we have. Everything worked out really well for her, and I’m very happy about it. We kind of lost James Burrows to Friends. We were begging him to stay, but he came back occasionally to direct. The stories he told about that show and those actors were something else.