Twenty five years ago, Phil Rosenthal hit the jackpot that every television writer dreams about.
Awarded the opportunity to create a four-camera CBS sitcom for stand-up comedian Ray Romano, Rosenthal and his star hit upon a concept and title that’s familiar to anyone that picked up a TV Guide during the 1990s: Everybody Loves Raymond. Premiering on Sept. 13, 1996, the series overcame initially modest ratings to become one of CBS’s most popular sitcoms, running for nine seasons and racking up dozens of Emmy statues, plus a lucrative syndication deal.
Everybody Loves Raymond is still on the airwaves a quarter century later, with episodes airing every day on TV Land. (It’s also streaming on Peacock for binge watchers.) According to Rosenthal, that’s always the future he envisioned for the sitcom that set him up for life. “I knew it was for CBS, but in the back of my mind, it was for TV Land — and now it’s on TV Land” the creator tells Yahoo Entertainment with a laugh. “To have gotten on the air at all was a miracle, so it’s like hitting the jackpot not just once, but over and over again.”
Ray Romano and Patricia Heaton in a Season 3 episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, which celebrates its 25th anniversary
Everybody Loves Raymond was also a jackpot that Rosenthal very nearly walked away from before the show premiered. He found himself at that crossroads when CBS inserted itself into the casting process for the actress that would play Romano’s wife — a part that eventually went to Patricia Heaton. But Heaton hadn’t even auditioned for Rosenthal when the network made it clear that they saw a specific type of actress in the role.
“CBS wanted someone hotter to play Debra,” he says, referring to the ’90s sitcom cliché where the schlubby male leads were routinely married to runway-ready women. (That eye-rolling convention was skewered in the recent AMC series Kevin Can F*** Himself, starring Annie Murphy.) “I almost quit the show over it.”
Romano and Heaton as Ray and Debra in Everybody Loves Raymond. CBS originally pushed for Rosenthal to cast a
Romano and Heaton as Ray and Debra in Everybody Loves Raymond. CBS originally pushed for Rosenthal to cast a “hotter” actress in the role of Debra
Before submitting his resignation letter, Rosenthal agreed to meet with CBS’s first choice for Debra, an actress he avoids naming in interviews or in his Raymond memoir, You’re Lucky You’re Funny. “They insisted on this actress. I thought she was wrong, but I met with her and she was a very pleasant, very nice person. She wasn’t going to read for the role, but during the meeting I convinced her to read a little bit with me, and she was 10 times worse for the part than I thought she would be!”
Next, Rosenthal had to sit down with network executives — including then-CBS head, Leslie Moonves — to discuss casting. He entered that meeting with his three choices for Debra, which included CBS’s preferred pick plus two other performers, and a strong suspicion that he would be leaving the room unemployed. “Again, I didn’t have Patty yet; I didn’t even know she existed. I did know that [Moonves] was going to say, ‘What about so-and-so,’ and if I don’t say, ‘Yes, let’s cast her,’ I won’t have a show. So that was the day I knew that I’d be quitting my own show.”
Fortunately for Rosenthal, that’s not how things played out.
When Moonves asked, “What about so-and-so,” Rosenthal gave him the only answer he could — the truth. “I said, ‘I love her and I’ve loved everything she’s been in. I think she’s terrific and beautiful, but then she read for me and I have to tell you it’s just not what I wrote. I just don’t see them as a couple. I think she could do it, but I also think that maybe we could do better. [Moonves] said, ‘Well, it’s just an idea.’ In other words, he let me slide and we agreed to keep looking! Two weeks later, Patty walked in and within five minutes she had the part. When it’s right, it’s right, and you know it immediately.” (Moonves resigned from CBS in 2018 over allegations of sexual misconduct.)
Rosenthal may have resolved the Debra situation in his favor, but there was one more near-walkout before Everybody Loves Raymond made it to the air. After CBS picked up the show — which also starred Brad Garrett as Romano’s police-officer brother, Robert, and Peter Boyle and Doris Roberts as his overbearing parents — his agent called him with an unexpected question: Who did he want to be the showrunner? “I assume me,” Rosenthal remembers saying.
