Ted Danson: Cheers was almost axed very early on
Ted Danson has admitted Cheers would have been axed if NBC had something to replace it with due to poor ratings in its first season.
Ted Danson has revealed Cheers was almost cancelled during its first season.
The 78-year-old actor - who led the cast of the sitcom as bar owner Sam Malone - recalled how the programme was a hit with critics when it debuted in 1982 but struggled to find an audience, even coming "dead last" in the ratings at one point.
Speaking to Jesse Tyler Ferguson on the Dinner's On Me podcast, he said: “Critics loved us. Everyone around us…the writers, everybody was so positive. 'Don’t pay attention, just keep doing it' kind of feedback, which was lovely, but we were dead last one week in the ratings.
“We were like... Jimmy [Burrows] likes to say we were 75th outta 70. There were only 70 shows.”
Ted was later told NBC "would have" scrapped the programme but "they had nothing to replace Cheers with."
Cheers went on to run for 11 seasons, winning six Golden Globe awards and 28 Primetime Emmys, before spawning spin-off show Frasier.
And once the programme became an established favourite, Ted's parents started tuning in.
He said: "My father always thought I should get a teaching degree in case it didn't work out. My mom was just thrilled. She was a grand appreciator.
"So they were happy, and then they bought their first TV so they could watch Cheers."
He jokingly added: "They got hooked. They got suckered into it, you know. So they bought one of those huge TVs that's like a piece of furniture."
Cheers co-creator James Burrows previously revealed the show would have ran for much longer if the Three Men and a Baby actor hadn't been ready to do new things.
He told Entertainment Weekly: "If Ted had wanted to stay, we would have kept going.
"The [cast] had the best jobs in the world. We were still on top. Regardless, they were all wonderful characters who could carry their own show."
Meanwhile, Ted recently recalled having had a "full on anxiety attack" ahead of filming his first acting job, a guest role on soap Somerset.
He told Deadline video series The Actor’s Side: "It was the scariest job I ever had, ever.
"My first day, the night before, I had my - aged 24 in New York - nervous breakdown, no, but anxiety attack. Full on anxiety attack.
"I called this wise friend, going, 'I'm not, I just can't'. He went, 'Don't do that, don't cut your nose off - take a Valium, and get up and go'.
"Took a Valium to discover me and Valium don't do well. I got up, and even as soon as I woke up, I was [in] sheets of Broadway news sweats."
