‘Gilmore Girls’: Richard Gilmore’s Edward Herrmann Once Said the Cast ‘Got Bored’ After 7 Years
Filming TV shows isn’t always as much fun as watching them at home. Fans of Gilmore Girls may love watching — and re-watching — the series but a cast member once admitted boredom happened. Gilmore Girls’ Edward Herrmann, the actor known for his role as the Gilmore family patriarch, Richard Gilmore, once admitted he and the rest of the Gilmore Girls cast got bored after playing the same roles for so long.
Edward Herrmann played Richard Gilmore for 7 years
Gilmore Girls premiered in October 2000 with a long list of characters in the fictional world of Stars Hollow. Lauren Graham played young single mother, Lorelai Gilmore, opposite Alexis Bledel as her best friend and 16-year-old daughter, Rory Gilmore.
Other main cast characters included Tony Award winner Kelly Bishop as Emily Gilmore, Lorelai’s mother and Rory’s grandmother. Then, of course, there was Herrmann as Richard, the bow tie-wearing, book-loving father to Lorelai and grandfather to Rory.
Because of the show’s success, Herrmann, and the rest of the cast, played their roles from 2000 to 2007 until Gilmore Girls got canceled after seven seasons. Although Herrmann didn’t have as many scenes as some of his co-stars, he still appeared in 154 episodes during the show’s original run, according to IMDb.
Edward Herrmann said it was ‘impossible’ not to get bored after 7 years on ‘Gilmore Girls’
Seven seasons isn’t the longest a TV show’s ever been on the air. Far from it. But as the now-deceased Herrmann — he died in 2014 at the age of 71 — told author A.S. Berman in 2009, boredom is inevitable on a long-running series.
“We all got bored,” he said, as part of an interview for the book, The Gilmore Girls Companion. “It’s impossible to do a show for seven years without running into some episodes that are a little formulaic. They’re not breaking any new ground and they’re not showing you anything really interesting.”
Directors helped keep things interesting on the ‘Gilmore Girls’ set
Over the course of seven seasons, Gilmore Girls had many different directors. Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino, her husband executive producer Dan Palladino, and Hocus Pocus’ Kenny Ortega were just a few. According to Herrmann, a new director meant a shift on set that would shake off the boredom.
“Then there are those episodes and those directors that suddenly: Whoa!, this is great, this really pops along, and you brighten up,” he said.
He also added that although he and his co-stars may have been bored occasionally it didn’t show in their work or how they acted on set. “I never expected anything from Lauren that was less than professional and that was less than focused,” he said. “She was always present, she was always right there, which was great fun. So was Kelly, by the way.”
Watch Gilmore Girls and Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life on Netflix.
