NBC’s Will & Grace Returns Tonight!

This summers TCA tour gave NBC the chance to re-introduce the cast of “Will & Grace” to everyone, as the much beloved, Emmy-award winning show returns to television tonight!

The cast and showrunners – including Eric McCormack (Will), Debra Messing (Grace), Sean Hayes (Jack), Megan Mullally (Karen), Max Mutchnick (Executive Producer/Co-Creator) and David Kohan (Executive Producer/Co-Creator) – sat down to discuss what’s the same, what’s different

Fans of “Will & Grace” are already excited – but an additional piece of great news was dropped at the panel. It’s already been picked up for a second season.

While the season finale originally had Grace and Will going their separate ways (at least for a while), getting married and having children, the new iteration of the show will ignore all that happened. (Too bad because we loved Harry Connick, Jr. and Bobby Cannavale as their respective spouses! Connick, Jr., however, is set to show up at least once as Leo in the new series.)

The original “Will & Grace” was an early entry in the LGBT conversation and star Debra Messing wants to continue that. “When we started, it was revolutionary to have two gay characters, so what we were able to address at the time was LGB. We stopped at B, and my hope is that now we can finish the alphabet.  And with gender identity, and there’s so many things that are being discussed in our culture now.”

Eric McCormack’s take? “I think that still, first and foremost, is the job, to be funny.  Will that include political and cultural things?  Of course it will.  First and foremost, it’s a funny show.”

Was it difficult to come back and reinhabit these characters and the chemistry? Megan Mullally says they have to stretch a bit more before rehearsal. In all seriousness, Max Mutchnick shared, “They hadn’t been at a table read for 11 years until yesterday, and the four of them sat down and read a script and I don’t think you guys read it before you were out there, right?  And they read this thing cold, and there were a lot of us in the room that were there originally and a lot that were new to the process.  And the new ones just could not believe how instantly they become this thing.”

Sean Hayes added, “It’s cliché, but it’s like riding a bike.  We’ve all become brothers and sisters and family.  Anything as far as moving forward with the show, it’s so easy.  Fits like a glove.  It’s just a blast.  It’s a gift of a lifetime to get together and do this again.”

The dysfunctional roommates and their equally dysfunctional friends return to NBC on tonight, September 28th at 9 pm.