The sitcom Will & Grace first premiered on NBC in 1998 for eight seasons. The series then returned to NBC in 2017 until the series finale in 2020. According to Deadline, the show initially looked quite different as there was a fifth leading cast member.
Actor Eric McCormack (Perception, Travelers), who played Will Truman in Will & Grace, revealed this in his new podcast titled Just Jack & Will. Sean Hayes (The Three Stooges, Cats & Dogs), who played Jack McFarland, hosts the podcast alongside McCormack. In the podcast, they embark on a Will & Grace rewatch and break down each episode. For the first podcast episode, they discussed the pilot.
As Deadline notes, McCormack stated, “There were five characters as regulars, and the fifth was my partner at my small law firm.”
In addition to McCormack and Hayes, the pilot featured Debra Messing (The Wedding Date, The Mysteries of Laura) as Grace Adler, Megan Mullally (Why Him?, Party Down) as Karen Walker, and the temporary fifth character played by Cress Williams (Hart of Dixie, Black Lightning).
According to Deadline, McCormack stated that Williams’s character was planned to be “just as important” as Grace and Jack. He described William’s character as a “straight guy probably written as Jewish.”
McCormack explained that five characters were seen as too much by the director of the series James Burrows (Cheers, Taxi). Burrows advised David Kohan (The Stones, Partners) and Max Mutchnick (Four Kings, Boston Common), who were the creators of Will & Grace, to cut back to just four main cast members.
In response to this, McCormack told the podcast “I felt so terrible. It was nothing he did or didn’t do… It just didn’t fit what the show is supposed to be.”
Will & Grace became one of NBC’s most popular series, and it revolved around the friendships between Will, Grace, Jack, and Karen. The series featured commentary about LGBTQ+ representation, relationship drama, the importance of culture, and more.
Fans of Will & Grace can now imagine how the series would have looked with Cress Williams as a part of the main cast.