Just a month after TV icon Roseanne Barr hinted that the cast of her iconic 1990s sitcom Roseanne was “up for a reunion show,” it seems that’s exactly what fans are going to get. A new report reveals that multiple venues, including Roseanne’s original home at ABC, along with the Netflix streaming service, are engaged in a bidding war for a Roseanne revival series. This new sitcom would bring back original series stars Roseanne Barr (Roseanne Connor), John Goodman (Dan Connor), Laurie Metcalf (Jackie Harris) and Sara Gilbert (Darlene Connor), among others.
Deadline broke this news earlier today, revealing that original Roseanne executive producers Tom Werner, Roseanne Barr and Bruce Helford will return as EP’s, along with Sara Gilbert and Whitney Cummings. Both Bruce Helford and Whitney Cummings will serve as the show’s co-showrunners. This report also reveals that the intent is to bring all of the hit sitcom’s original stars back, including current Big Bang Theory star Johnny Galecki, who played David Healy on the show from 1992 to 1997, along with Michael Fishman as D.J. Connor and Alicia Goranson as Becky Connor.
This new sitcom revival comes just a month after a unique reunion took place on the morning talk show The Talk. Sara Gilbert now serves as one of the hosts of The Talk, with the actress/host bringing back her TV dad John Goodman for a reunion, where Darlene finally tells her dad Dan that she has become a talk show host, with a relieved Dan saying that he thought she was going to tell him she’s gay. It’s possible that this reunion helped set this revival in motion. It isn’t clear if original series creator Matt Williams will be involved in this revival.
While no details about this revival have been confirmed, Roseanne Barr offered some unique details on her official website in 2009, regarding what these characters may be up to now. Both Roseanne and Jackie had opened the first marijuana dispensary in Langford, Illinois, while John Goodman’s Dan Connor resurfacing, after it was revealed that he had in fact faked his own death. DJ Connor had gone on to become a published author, although Mark Healy (David Quinn) had died in Iraq. David had left Darlene for a woman half his age, while Darlene had come out as a lesbian, and having a baby with her new female lover, and Becky was working at a local Wal-Mart. Whether or not any of these stories will be used for the Roseanne revival is unclear, but hopefully we’ll get confirmation about where this show will land soon. In the meantime, take a look at this brief Roseanne reunion from The Talk last month.
Roseanne aired on ABC for nine seasons between 1988 and 1997, following the working class Illinois family the Connors. The final season is still considered to be quite controversial, with the Connors winning the lottery. The series finale was even more divisive, revealing that the entire show was in the past, with Roseanne writing a book about her life, which she had embellished quite a bit. For instance, Dan Connor never survived the heart attack he had at the end of Season 8, and the Connors didn’t actually win the lottery, it was all just a fantasy Roseanne had about her life. May 20 will mark the 20th Anniversary of the series finale, which drew in 16 million viewers. The original series was home to some up and coming writers who went on to have amazing careers in their own right, such as Chuck Lorre (The Big Bang Theory), Amy Sherman-Palladino (Gilmore Girls), Eileen Heisler and DeAnn Heline (The Middle) and Joss Whedon, who made his TV writing debut on Roseanne before going on to write Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Toy Story and much, much more.
