40 Years After Premiere, Rhea Perlman Shares Unexpected Joys Of Filming ‘Cheers’

The day was September 30, 1982, and the first episode of Cheers premiered on NBC. It would feature a star-studded cast including Ted Danson, Shelley Long, Nicholas Colasanto, Rhea Perlman, and George Wendt – to name just a few. Its legacy also spawned new shows and even more memories. Celebrating 40 years of Cheers, Perlman is sharing memories that confirm for all the laughs the series brought viewers, it brought the cast just as many to make.

According to Danson, Perlman was one of the first people cast in Cheers, though Perlman remembers auditioning opposite Long, confirming Diane Chambers had her actor by then, at least. The audition process, set in a Paramount room stuffed with all the writers, was an intimidating one. Enough so that Perlman admitted, “I’ve blocked that part out of my memory.” After that, though, it was all uphill.

Rhea Perlman remembers the journey ‘Cheers’ took her on 40 years ago

The very start of Perlman’s career was with small roles in off-Broadway productions and bit roles in short films. Her fortunes changed a bit starting with Taxi, and then came her gig as Carla Tortelli. Once she proved herself at auditions, she was told “OK, you’re in,” and only kept the memories of everything that happened after. First, came the pilot. “The way we filmed the episodes back then,” Perlman shared, “is that we’d basically film everything once, maybe twice, in front of the audience. If there was a big mistake, we’d stop and do that section over again so we could get the laughs in. Then after the audience applauded wildly, they would go home and we’d do pieces of it again or, rarely, all of it again.”

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Even following this procedure, there was room for experimenting. “Once in awhile, the writers would come up with a new joke or something that we’d add in,” Perlman added. Cheers got off to a very rough start and was almost canceled for low ratings in the first season. Perlman admitted that “it took maybe a year or two before many, many people would stop me on the street or in the supermarket. But we always felt that we were on a show that was popular and on top.”

40 years ago, ‘Cheers’ gave the actors as much joy as it gave the viewers

With such a limited set, Cheers took full advantage of all the fun plots it could pursue and the script had Perlman excited throughout, ready to try out wild scenes. “I was so excited to be doing a food fight,” she said of the Thanksgiving episode. “We got to do that twice, because we did it in the dress rehearsal and during the taping. I’d never had a food fight in real life, and it was the most fun thing ever. I wanted to do it everyday!”

She further reflected, “I had three kids during the show, and the fact that I could carry on this amazing show and my life simultaneously was such a gift. They made it so easy for us. Other people were having babies, too, so there were all these kids around us. It was something in the beer, I guess!” Perlman was so attached to the bar setting that when she was offered a spinoff, she turned it down. Carla already gave her a lot to work with, since “every piece of the show was there before we were cast. We all brought our personalities, so I don’t feel like deep changes were made to accommodate the actors. The actors fit into what they wrote, and I was always very thankful for that.” In the end, Cheers provided 40 years of good memories for cast members and fans alike.